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diff --git a/old/7464-8.txt b/old/7464-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5f153fe --- /dev/null +++ b/old/7464-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,10406 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Adventures of Sally, by P. G. Wodehouse + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Adventures of Sally + +Author: P. G. Wodehouse + +Release Date: February, 2005 [EBook #7464] +[This file last updated on July 17, 2010] +Posting Date: July 31, 2009 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ADVENTURES OF SALLY *** + + + + +Produced by Tim Barnett + + + + + +THE ADVENTURES OF SALLY + + +By P. G. Wodehouse + + + + + +CHAPTER I. SALLY GIVES A PARTY + + + +1 + +Sally looked contentedly down the long table. She felt happy at last. +Everybody was talking and laughing now, and her party, rallying after an +uncertain start, was plainly the success she had hoped it would be. The +first atmosphere of uncomfortable restraint, caused, she was only too +well aware, by her brother Fillmore's white evening waistcoat, had +worn off; and the male and female patrons of Mrs. Meecher's select +boarding-house (transient and residential) were themselves again. + +At her end of the table the conversation had turned once more to the +great vital topic of Sally's legacy and what she ought to do with it. +The next best thing to having money of one's own, is to dictate the +spending of somebody else's, and Sally's guests were finding a good deal +of satisfaction in arranging a Budget for her. Rumour having put the +sum at their disposal at a high figure, their suggestions had certain +spaciousness. + +"Let me tell you," said Augustus Bartlett, briskly, "what I'd do, if +I were you." Augustus Bartlett, who occupied an intensely subordinate +position in the firm of Kahn, Morris and Brown, the Wall Street brokers, +always affected a brisk, incisive style of speech, as befitted a man +in close touch with the great ones of Finance. "I'd sink a couple of +hundred thousand in some good, safe bond-issue--we've just put one out +which you would do well to consider--and play about with the rest. When +I say play about, I mean have a flutter in anything good that crops up. +Multiple Steel's worth looking at. They tell me it'll be up to a hundred +and fifty before next Saturday." + +Elsa Doland, the pretty girl with the big eyes who sat on Mr. Bartlett's +left, had other views. + +"Buy a theatre. Sally, and put on good stuff." + +"And lose every bean you've got," said a mild young man, with a deep +voice across the table. "If I had a few hundred thousand," said the +mild young man, "I'd put every cent of it on Benny Whistler for the +heavyweight championship. I've private information that Battling Tuke +has been got at and means to lie down in the seventh..." + +"Say, listen," interrupted another voice, "lemme tell you what I'd do +with four hundred thousand..." + +"If I had four hundred thousand," said Elsa Doland, "I know what would +be the first thing I'd do." + +"What's that?" asked Sally. + +"Pay my bill for last week, due this morning." + +Sally got up quickly, and flitting down the table, put her arm round her +friend's shoulder and whispered in her ear: + +"Elsa darling, are you really broke? If you are, you know, I'll..." + +Elsa Doland laughed. + +"You're an angel, Sally. There's no one like you. You'd give your last +cent to anyone. Of course I'm not broke. I've just come back from the +road, and I've saved a fortune. I only said that to draw you." + +Sally returned to her seat, relieved, and found that the company had now +divided itself into two schools of thought. The conservative and prudent +element, led by Augustus Bartlett, had definitely decided on three +hundred thousand in Liberty Bonds and the rest in some safe real estate; +while the smaller, more sporting section, impressed by the mild young +man's inside information, had already placed Sally's money on Benny +Whistler, doling it out cautiously in small sums so as not to spoil the +market. And so solid, it seemed, was Mr. Tuke's reputation with those +in the inner circle of knowledge that the mild young man was confident +that, if you went about the matter cannily and without precipitation, +three to one might be obtained. It seemed to Sally that the time had +come to correct certain misapprehensions. + +"I don't know where you get your figures," she said, "but I'm afraid +they're wrong. I've just twenty-five thousand dollars." + +The statement had a chilling effect. To these jugglers with +half-millions the amount mentioned seemed for the moment almost too +small to bother about. It was the sort of sum which they had been +mentally setting aside for the heiress's car fare. Then they managed to +adjust their minds to it. After all, one could do something even with a +pittance like twenty-five thousand. + +"If I'd twenty-five thousand," said Augustus Bartlett, the first to +rally from the shock, "I'd buy Amalgamated..." + +"If I had twenty-five thousand..." began Elsa Doland. + +"If I'd had twenty-five thousand in the year nineteen hundred," observed +a gloomy-looking man with spectacles, "I could have started a revolution +in Paraguay." + +He brooded sombrely on what might have been. + +"Well, I'll tell you exactly what I'm going to do," said Sally. "I'm +going to start with a trip to Europe... France, specially. I've heard +France well spoken of--as soon as I can get my passport; and after I've +loafed there for a few weeks, I'm coming back to look about and find +some nice cosy little business which will let me put money into it and +keep me in luxury. Are there any complaints?" + +"Even a couple of thousand on Benny Whistler..." said the mild young +man. + +"I don't want your Benny Whistler," said Sally. "I wouldn't have him if +you gave him to me. If I want to lose money, I'll go to Monte Carlo and +do it properly." + +"Monte Carlo," said the gloomy man, brightening up at the magic name. +"I was in Monte Carlo in the year '97, and if I'd had another fifty +dollars... just fifty... I'd have..." + +At the far end of the table there was a stir, a cough, and the grating +of a chair on the floor; and slowly, with that easy grace which actors +of the old school learned in the days when acting was acting, Mr. +Maxwell Faucitt, the boarding-house's oldest inhabitant, rose to his +feet. + +"Ladies," said Mr. Faucitt, bowing courteously, "and..." ceasing to bow +and casting from beneath his white and venerable eyebrows a quelling +glance at certain male members of the boarding-house's younger set who +were showing a disposition towards restiveness, "... gentlemen. I feel +that I cannot allow this occasion to pass without saying a few words." + +His audience did not seem surprised. It was possible that life, always +prolific of incident in a great city like New York, might some day +produce an occasion which Mr. Faucitt would feel that he could allow to +pass without saying a few words; but nothing of the sort had happened as +yet, and they had given up hope. Right from the start of the meal they +had felt that it would be optimism run mad to expect the old gentleman +to abstain from speech on the night of Sally Nicholas' farewell +dinner party; and partly because they had braced themselves to it, but +principally because Miss Nicholas' hospitality had left them with a +genial feeling of repletion, they settled themselves to listen +with something resembling equanimity. A movement on the part of the +Marvellous Murphys--new arrivals, who had been playing the Bushwick with +their equilibristic act during the preceding week--to form a party of +the extreme left and heckle the speaker, broke down under a cold look +from their hostess. Brief though their acquaintance had been, both of +these lissom young gentlemen admired Sally immensely. + +And it should be set on record that this admiration of theirs was not +misplaced. He would have been hard to please who had not been attracted +by Sally. She was a small, trim, wisp of a girl with the tiniest hands +and feet, the friendliest of smiles, and a dimple that came and went +in the curve of her rounded chin. Her eyes, which disappeared when she +laughed, which was often, were a bright hazel; her hair a soft mass of +brown. She had, moreover, a manner, an air of distinction lacking in the +majority of Mrs. Meecher's guests. And she carried youth like a banner. +In approving of Sally, the Marvellous Murphys had been guilty of no +lapse from their high critical standard. + +"I have been asked," proceeded Mr. Faucitt, "though I am aware that +there are others here far worthier of such a task--Brutuses compared +with whom I, like Marc Antony, am no orator--I have been asked to +propose the health..." + +"Who asked you?" It was the smaller of the Marvellous Murphys who spoke. +He was an unpleasant youth, snub-nosed and spotty. Still, he could +balance himself with one hand on an inverted ginger-ale bottle while +revolving a barrel on the soles of his feet. There is good in all of us. + +"I have been asked," repeated Mr. Faucitt, ignoring the unmannerly +interruption, which, indeed, he would have found it hard to answer, "to +propose the health of our charming hostess (applause), coupled with the +name of her brother, our old friend Fillmore Nicholas." + +The gentleman referred to, who sat at the speaker's end of the table, +acknowledged the tribute with a brief nod of the head. It was a nod of +condescension; the nod of one who, conscious of being hedged about by +social inferiors, nevertheless does his best to be not unkindly. And +Sally, seeing it, debated in her mind for an instant the advisability +of throwing an orange at her brother. There was one lying ready to her +hand, and his glistening shirt-front offered an admirable mark; but +she restrained herself. After all, if a hostess yields to her primitive +impulses, what happens? Chaos. She had just frowned down the exuberance +of the rebellious Murphys, and she felt that if, even with the highest +motives, she began throwing fruit, her influence for good in that +quarter would be weakened. + +She leaned back with a sigh. The temptation had been hard to resist. A +democratic girl, pomposity was a quality which she thoroughly disliked; +and though she loved him, she could not disguise from herself that, +ever since affluence had descended upon him some months ago, her brother +Fillmore had become insufferably pompous. If there are any young men +whom inherited wealth improves, Fillmore Nicholas was not one of them. +He seemed to regard himself nowadays as a sort of Man of Destiny. To +converse with him was for the ordinary human being like being received +in audience by some more than stand-offish monarch. It had taken Sally +over an hour to persuade him to leave his apartment on Riverside Drive +and revisit the boarding-house for this special occasion; and, when he +had come, he had entered wearing such faultless evening dress that he +had made the rest of the party look like a gathering of tramp-cyclists. +His white waistcoat alone was a silent reproach to honest poverty, +and had caused an awkward constraint right through the soup and fish +courses. Most of those present had known Fillmore Nicholas as an +impecunious young man who could make a tweed suit last longer than one +would have believed possible; they had called him "Fill" and helped him +in more than usually lean times with small loans: but to-night they had +eyed the waistcoat dumbly and shrank back abashed. + +"Speaking," said Mr. Faucitt, "as an Englishman--for though I have long +since taken out what are technically known as my 'papers' it was as a +subject of the island kingdom that I first visited this great country--I +may say that the two factors in American life which have always made +the profoundest impression upon me have been the lavishness of American +hospitality and the charm of the American girl. To-night we have been +privileged to witness the American girl in the capacity of hostess, and +I think I am right in saying, in asseverating, in committing myself to +the statement that this has been a night which none of us present here +will ever forget. Miss Nicholas has given us, ladies and gentlemen, a +banquet. I repeat, a banquet. There has been alcoholic refreshment. I +do not know where it came from: I do not ask how it was procured, but we +have had it. Miss Nicholas..." + +Mr. Faucitt paused to puff at his cigar. Sally's brother Fillmore +suppressed a yawn and glanced at his watch. Sally continued to lean +forward raptly. She knew how happy it made the old gentleman to deliver +a formal speech; and though she wished the subject had been different, +she was prepared to listen indefinitely. + +"Miss Nicholas," resumed Mr. Faucitt, lowering his cigar, "... But why," +he demanded abruptly, "do I call her Miss Nicholas?" + +"Because it's her name," hazarded the taller Murphy. + +Mr. Faucitt eyed him with disfavour. He disapproved of the marvellous +brethren on general grounds because, himself a resident of years +standing, he considered that these transients from the vaudeville stage +lowered the tone of the boarding-house; but particularly because the one +who had just spoken had, on his first evening in the place, addressed +him as "grandpa." + +"Yes, sir," he said severely, "it is her name. But she has another name, +sweeter to those who love her, those who worship her, those who have +watched her with the eye of sedulous affection through the three years +she has spent beneath this roof, though that name," said Mr. Faucitt, +lowering the tone of his address and descending to what might almost be +termed personalities, "may not be familiar to a couple of dud acrobats +who have only been in the place a week-end, thank heaven, and are off +to-morrow to infest some other city. That name," said Mr. Faucitt, +soaring once more to a loftier plane, "is Sally. Our Sally. For three +years our Sally has flitted about this establishment like--I choose the +simile advisedly--like a ray of sunshine. For three years she has +made life for us a brighter, sweeter thing. And now a sudden access of +worldly wealth, happily synchronizing with her twenty-first birthday, is +to remove her from our midst. From our midst, ladies and gentlemen, +but not from our hearts. And I think I may venture to hope, to +prognosticate, that, whatever lofty sphere she may adorn in the future, +to whatever heights in the social world she may soar, she will still +continue to hold a corner in her own golden heart for the comrades of +her Bohemian days. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you our hostess, Miss +Sally Nicholas, coupled with the name of our old friend, her brother +Fillmore." + +Sally, watching her brother heave himself to his feet as the cheers died +away, felt her heart beat a little faster with anticipation. Fillmore +was a fluent young man, once a power in his college debating society, +and it was for that reason that she had insisted on his coming here +tonight. + +She had guessed that Mr. Faucitt, the old dear, would say all sorts of +delightful things about her, and she had mistrusted her ability to +make a fitting reply. And it was imperative that a fitting reply should +proceed from someone. She knew Mr. Faucitt so well. He looked on these +occasions rather in the light of scenes from some play; and, sustaining +his own part in them with such polished grace, was certain to be pained +by anything in the nature of an anti-climax after he should have ceased +to take the stage. Eloquent himself, he must be answered with eloquence, +or his whole evening would be spoiled. + +Fillmore Nicholas smoothed a wrinkle out of his white waistcoat; and +having rested one podgy hand on the table-cloth and the thumb of the +other in his pocket, glanced down the table with eyes so haughtily +drooping that Sally's fingers closed automatically about her orange, as +she wondered whether even now it might not be a good thing... + +It seems to be one of Nature's laws that the most attractive girls +should have the least attractive brothers. Fillmore Nicholas had not +worn well. At the age of seven he had been an extraordinarily beautiful +child, but after that he had gone all to pieces; and now, at the age of +twenty-five, it would be idle to deny that he was something of a mess. +For the three years preceding his twenty-fifth birthday, restricted +means and hard work had kept his figure in check; but with money there +had come an ever-increasing sleekness. He looked as if he fed too often +and too well. + +All this, however, Sally was prepared to forgive him, if he would only +make a good speech. She could see Mr. Faucitt leaning back in his chair, +all courteous attention. Rolling periods were meat and drink to the old +gentleman. + +Fillmore spoke. + +"I'm sure," said Fillmore, "you don't want a speech... Very good of you +to drink our health. Thank you." + +He sat down. + +The effect of these few simple words on the company was marked, but not +in every case identical. To the majority the emotion which they brought +was one of unmixed relief. There had been something so menacing, so easy +and practised, in Fillmore's attitude as he had stood there that the +gloomier-minded had given him at least twenty minutes, and even the +optimists had reckoned that they would be lucky if they got off with +ten. As far as the bulk of the guests were concerned, there was +no grumbling. Fillmore's, to their thinking, had been the ideal +after-dinner speech. + +Far different was it with Mr. Maxwell Faucitt. The poor old man was +wearing such an expression of surprise and dismay as he might have +worn had somebody unexpectedly pulled the chair from under him. He was +feeling the sick shock which comes to those who tread on a non-existent +last stair. And Sally, catching sight of his face, uttered a sharp +wordless exclamation as if she had seen a child fall down and hurt +itself in the street. The next moment she had run round the table and +was standing behind him with her arms round his neck. She spoke across +him with a sob in her voice. + +"My brother," she stammered, directing a malevolent look at the +immaculate Fillmore, who, avoiding her gaze, glanced down his nose +and smoothed another wrinkle out of his waistcoat, "has not said +quite--quite all I hoped he was going to say. I can't make a speech, +but..." Sally gulped, "... but, I love you all and of course I shall +never forget you, and... and..." + +Here Sally kissed Mr. Faucitt and burst into tears. + +"There, there," said Mr. Faucitt, soothingly. The kindest critic could +not have claimed that Sally had been eloquent: nevertheless Mr. Maxwell +Faucitt was conscious of no sense of anti-climax. + + + +2 + + + +Sally had just finished telling her brother Fillmore what a pig he was. +The lecture had taken place in the street outside the boarding-house +immediately on the conclusion of the festivities, when Fillmore, who +had furtively collected his hat and overcoat, had stolen forth into the +night, had been overtaken and brought to bay by his justly indignant +sister. Her remarks, punctuated at intervals by bleating sounds from the +accused, had lasted some ten minutes. + +As she paused for breath, Fillmore seemed to expand, like an indiarubber +ball which has been sat on. Dignified as he was to the world, he had +never been able to prevent himself being intimidated by Sally when +in one of these moods of hers. He regretted this, for it hurt his +self-esteem, but he did not see how the fact could be altered. Sally +had always been like that. Even the uncle, who after the deaths of their +parents had become their guardian, had never, though a grim man, been +able to cope successfully with Sally. In that last hectic scene three +years ago, which had ended in their going out into the world, together +like a second Adam and Eve, the verbal victory had been hers. And it +had been Sally who had achieved triumph in the one battle which Mrs. +Meecher, apparently as a matter of duty, always brought about with each +of her patrons in the first week of their stay. A sweet-tempered +girl, Sally, like most women of a generous spirit, had cyclonic +potentialities. + +As she seemed to have said her say, Fillmore kept on expanding till he +had reached the normal, when he ventured upon a speech for the defence. + +"What have I done?" demanded Fillmore plaintively. + +"Do you want to hear all over again?" + +"No, no," said Fillmore hastily. "But, listen. Sally, you don't +understand my position. You don't seem to realize that all that sort of +thing, all that boarding-house stuff, is a thing of the past. One's got +beyond it. One wants to drop it. One wants to forget it, darn it! Be +fair. Look at it from my viewpoint. I'm going to be a big man..." + +"You're going to be a fat man," said Sally, coldly. + +Fillmore refrained from discussing the point. He was sensitive. + +"I'm going to do big things," he substituted. "I've got a deal on at +this very moment which... well, I can't tell you about it, but it's +going to be big. Well, what I'm driving at, is about all this sort of +thing"--he indicated the lighted front of Mrs. Meecher's home-from-home +with a wide gesture--"is that it's over. Finished and done with. These +people were all very well when..." + +"... when you'd lost your week's salary at poker and wanted to borrow a +few dollars for the rent." + +"I always paid them back," protested Fillmore, defensively. + +"I did." + +"Well, we did," said Fillmore, accepting the amendment with the air of +a man who has no time for chopping straws. "Anyway, what I mean is, I +don't see why, just because one has known people at a certain period in +one's life when one was practically down and out, one should have +them round one's neck for ever. One can't prevent people forming an +I-knew-him-when club, but, darn it, one needn't attend the meetings." + +"One's friends..." + +"Oh, friends," said Fillmore. "That's just where all this makes me so +tired. One's in a position where all these people are entitled to call +themselves one's friends, simply because father put it in his will that +I wasn't to get the money till I was twenty-five, instead of letting me +have it at twenty-one like anybody else. I wonder where I should have +been by now if I could have got that money when I was twenty-one." + +"In the poor-house, probably," said Sally. + +Fillmore was wounded. + +"Ah! you don't believe in me," he sighed. + +"Oh, you would be all right if you had one thing," said Sally. + +Fillmore passed his qualities in swift review before his mental eye. +Brains? Dash? Spaciousness? Initiative? All present and correct. He +wondered where Sally imagined the hiatus to exist. + +"One thing?" he said. "What's that?" + +"A nurse." + +Fillmore's sense of injury deepened. He supposed that this was always +the way, that those nearest to a man never believed in his ability +till he had proved it so masterfully that it no longer required the +assistance of faith. Still, it was trying; and there was not much +consolation to be derived from the thought that Napoleon had had to go +through this sort of thing in his day. "I shall find my place in the +world," he said sulkily. + +"Oh, you'll find your place all right," said Sally. "And I'll come +round and bring you jelly and read to you on the days when visitors are +allowed... Oh, hullo." + +The last remark was addressed to a young man who had been swinging +briskly along the sidewalk from the direction of Broadway and who now, +coming abreast of them, stopped. + +"Good evening, Mr. Foster." + +"Good evening. Miss Nicholas." + +"You don't know my brother, do you?" + +"I don't believe I do." + +"He left the underworld before you came to it," said Sally. "You +wouldn't think it to look at him, but he was once a prune-eater among +the proletariat, even as you and I. Mrs. Meecher looks on him as a son." + +The two men shook hands. Fillmore was not short, but Gerald Foster +with his lean, well-built figure seemed to tower over him. He was an +Englishman, a man in the middle twenties, clean-shaven, keen-eyed, and +very good to look at. Fillmore, who had recently been going in for one +of those sum-up-your-fellow-man-at-a-glance courses, the better to fit +himself for his career of greatness, was rather impressed. It seemed to +him that this Mr. Foster, like himself, was one of those who Get There. +If you are that kind yourself, you get into the knack of recognizing the +others. It is a sort of gift. + +There was a few moments of desultory conversation, of the kind that +usually follows an introduction, and then Fillmore, by no means sorry +to get the chance, took advantage of the coming of this new arrival to +remove himself. He had not enjoyed his chat with Sally, and it seemed +probable that he would enjoy a continuation of it even less. He was glad +that Mr. Foster had happened along at this particular juncture. Excusing +himself briefly, he hurried off down the street. + +Sally stood for a minute, watching him till he had disappeared round the +corner. She had a slightly regretful feeling that, now it was too late, +she would think of a whole lot more good things which it would have been +agreeable to say to him. And it had become obvious to her that Fillmore +was not getting nearly enough of that kind of thing said to him +nowadays. Then she dismissed him from her mind and turning to Gerald +Foster, slipped her arm through his. + +"Well, Jerry, darling," she said. "What a shame you couldn't come to the +party. Tell me all about everything." + + + +3 + + + +It was exactly two months since Sally had become engaged to Gerald +Foster; but so rigorously had they kept the secret that nobody at Mrs. +Meecher's so much as suspected it. To Sally, who all her life had hated +concealing things, secrecy of any kind was objectionable: but in this +matter Gerald had shown an odd streak almost of furtiveness in his +character. An announced engagement complicated life. People fussed about +you and bothered you. People either watched you or avoided you. Such +were his arguments, and Sally, who would have glossed over and found +excuses for a disposition on his part towards homicide or arson, put +them down to artistic sensitiveness. There is nobody so sensitive as +your artist, particularly if he be unsuccessful: and when an artist has +so little success that he cannot afford to make a home for the woman +he loves, his sensitiveness presumably becomes great indeed. Putting +herself in his place, Sally could see that a protracted engagement, +known by everybody, would be a standing advertisement of Gerald's +failure to make good: and she acquiesced in the policy of secrecy, +hoping that it would not last long. It seemed absurd to think of Gerald +as an unsuccessful man. He had in him, as the recent Fillmore had +perceived, something dynamic. He was one of those men of whom one could +predict that they would succeed very suddenly and rapidly--overnight, as +it were. + +"The party," said Sally, "went off splendidly." They had passed the +boarding-house door, and were walking slowly down the street. "Everybody +enjoyed themselves, I think, even though Fillmore did his best to spoil +things by coming looking like an advertisement of What The Smart Men +Will Wear This Season. You didn't see his waistcoat just now. He +had covered it up. Conscience, I suppose. It was white and bulgy and +gleaming and full up of pearl buttons and everything. I saw Augustus +Bartlett curl up like a burnt feather when he caught sight of it. Still, +time seemed to heal the wound, and everybody relaxed after a bit. Mr. +Faucitt made a speech and I made a speech and cried, and...oh, it was +all very festive. It only needed you." + +"I wish I could have come. I had to go to that dinner, though. Sally..." +Gerald paused, and Sally saw that he was electric with suppressed +excitement. "Sally, the play's going to be put on!" + +Sally gave a little gasp. She had lived this moment in anticipation for +weeks. She had always known that sooner or later this would happen. She +had read his plays over and over again, and was convinced that they were +wonderful. Of course, hers was a biased view, but then Elsa Doland also +admired them; and Elsa's opinion was one that carried weight. Elsa was +another of those people who were bound to succeed suddenly. Even old Mr. +Faucitt, who was a stern judge of acting and rather inclined to consider +that nowadays there was no such thing, believed that she was a girl with +a future who would do something big directly she got her chance. + +"Jerry!" She gave his arm a hug. "How simply terrific! Then Goble and +Kohn have changed their minds after all and want it? I knew they would." + +A slight cloud seemed to dim the sunniness of the author's mood. + +"No, not that one," he said reluctantly. "No hope there, I'm afraid. I +saw Goble this morning about that, and he said it didn't add up right. +The one that's going to be put on is 'The Primrose Way.' You remember? +It's got a big part for a girl in it." + +"Of course! The one Elsa liked so much. Well, that's just as good. Who's +going to do it? I thought you hadn't sent it out again." + +"Well, it happens..." Gerald hesitated once more. "It seems that this +man I was dining with to-night--a man named Cracknell..." + +"Cracknell? Not the Cracknell?" + +"The Cracknell?" + +"The one people are always talking about. The man they call the +Millionaire Kid." + +"Yes. Why, do you know him?" + +"He was at Harvard with Fillmore. I never saw him, but he must be rather +a painful person." + +"Oh, he's all right. Not much brains, of course, but--well, he's all +right. And, anyway, he wants to put the play on." + +"Well, that's splendid," said Sally: but she could not get the right +ring of enthusiasm into her voice. She had had ideals for Gerald. She +had dreamed of him invading Broadway triumphantly under the banner of +one of the big managers whose name carried a prestige, and there seemed +something unworthy in this association with a man whose chief claim to +eminence lay in the fact that he was credited by metropolitan gossip +with possessing the largest private stock of alcohol in existence. + +"I thought you would be pleased," said Gerald. + +"Oh, I am," said Sally. + +With the buoyant optimism which never deserted her for long, she had +already begun to cast off her momentary depression. After all, did +it matter who financed a play so long as it obtained a production? A +manager was simply a piece of machinery for paying the bills; and if +he had money for that purpose, why demand asceticism and the finer +sensibilities from him? The real thing that mattered was the question +of who was going to play the leading part, that deftly drawn character +which had so excited the admiration of Elsa Doland. She sought +information on this point. + +"Who will play Ruth?" she asked. "You must have somebody wonderful. It +needs a tremendously clever woman. Did Mr. Cracknell say anything about +that?" + +"Oh, yes, we discussed that, of course." + +"Well?" + +"Well, it seems..." Again Sally noticed that odd, almost stealthy +embarrassment. Gerald appeared unable to begin a sentence to-night +without feeling his way into it like a man creeping cautiously down a +dark alley. She noticed it the more because it was so different from +his usual direct method. Gerald, as a rule, was not one of those who +apologize for themselves. He was forthright and masterful and inclined +to talk to her from a height. To-night he seemed different. + +He broke off, was silent for a moment, and began again with a question. + +"Do you know Mabel Hobson?" + +"Mabel Hobson? I've seen her in the 'Follies,' of course." + +Sally started. A suspicion had stung her, so monstrous that its +absurdity became manifest the moment it had formed. And yet was +it absurd? Most Broadway gossip filtered eventually into the +boarding-house, chiefly through the medium of that seasoned sport, the +mild young man who thought so highly of the redoubtable Benny Whistler, +and she was aware that the name of Reginald Cracknell, which was always +getting itself linked with somebody, had been coupled with that of Miss +Hobson. It seemed likely that in this instance rumour spoke truth, +for the lady was of that compellingly blonde beauty which attracts the +Cracknells of this world. But even so... + +"It seems that Cracknell..." said Gerald. "Apparently this man +Cracknell..." He was finding Sally's bright, horrified gaze somewhat +trying. "Well, the fact is Cracknell believes in Mabel Hobson...and... +well, he thinks this part would suit her." + +"Oh, Jerry!" + +Could infatuation go to such a length? Could even the spacious heart of +a Reginald Cracknell so dominate that gentleman's small size in heads as +to make him entrust a part like Ruth in "The Primrose Way" to one who, +when desired by the producer of her last revue to carry a bowl of roses +across the stage and place it on a table, had rebelled on the plea that +she had not been engaged as a dancer? Surely even lovelorn Reginald +could perceive that this was not the stuff of which great emotional +actresses are made. + +"Oh, Jerry!" she said again. + +There was an uncomfortable silence. They turned and walked back in the +direction of the boarding-house. Somehow Gerald's arm had managed to get +itself detached from Sally's. She was conscious of a curious dull ache +that was almost like a physical pain. + +"Jerry! Is it worth it?" she burst out vehemently. + +The question seemed to sting the young man into something like his usual +decisive speech. + +"Worth it? Of course it's worth it. It's a Broadway production. That's +all that matters. Good heavens! I've been trying long enough to get a +play on Broadway, and it isn't likely that I'm going to chuck away my +chance when it comes along just because one might do better in the way +of casting." + +"But, Jerry! Mabel Hobson! It's... it's murder! Murder in the first +degree." + +"Nonsense. She'll be all right. The part will play itself. Besides, +she has a personality and a following, and Cracknell will spend all the +money in the world to make the thing a success. And it will be a start, +whatever happens. Of course, it's worth it." + +Fillmore would have been impressed by this speech. He would have +recognized and respected in it the unmistakable ring which characterizes +even the lightest utterances of those who get there. On Sally it had not +immediately that effect. Nevertheless, her habit of making the best of +things, working together with that primary article of her creed that +the man she loved could do no wrong, succeeded finally in raising her +spirits. Of course Jerry was right. It would have been foolish to refuse +a contract because all its clauses were not ideal. + +"You old darling," she said affectionately attaching herself to the +vacant arm once more and giving it a penitent squeeze, "you're quite +right. Of course you are. I can see it now. I was only a little startled +at first. Everything's going to be wonderful. Let's get all our chickens +out and count 'em. How are you going to spend the money?" + +"I know how I'm going to spend a dollar of it," said Gerald completely +restored. + +"I mean the big money. What's a dollar?" + +"It pays for a marriage-licence." + +Sally gave his arm another squeeze. + +"Ladies and gentlemen," she said. "Look at this man. Observe him. My +partner!" + + + + +CHAPTER II. ENTER GINGER + + + +1 + + + +Sally was sitting with her back against a hillock of golden sand, +watching with half-closed eyes the denizens of Roville-sur-Mer at their +familiar morning occupations. At Roville, as at most French seashore +resorts, the morning is the time when the visiting population assembles +in force on the beach. Whiskered fathers of families made cheerful +patches of colour in the foreground. Their female friends and relatives +clustered in groups under gay parasols. Dogs roamed to and fro, and +children dug industriously with spades, ever and anon suspending their +labours in order to smite one another with these handy implements. One +of the dogs, a poodle of military aspect, wandered up to Sally: and +discovering that she was in possession of a box of sweets, decided to +remain and await developments. + +Few things are so pleasant as the anticipation of them, but Sally's +vacation had proved an exception to this rule. It had been a magic month +of lazy happiness. She had drifted luxuriously from one French town to +another, till the charm of Roville, with its blue sky, its Casino, +its snow-white hotels along the Promenade, and its general glitter +and gaiety, had brought her to a halt. Here she could have stayed +indefinitely, but the voice of America was calling her back. Gerald had +written to say that "The Primrose Way" was to be produced in Detroit, +preliminary to its New York run, so soon that, if she wished to see the +opening, she must return at once. A scrappy, hurried, unsatisfactory +letter, the letter of a busy man: but one that Sally could not ignore. +She was leaving Roville to-morrow. + +To-day, however, was to-day: and she sat and watched the bathers with +a familiar feeling of peace, revelling as usual in the still novel +sensation of having nothing to do but bask in the warm sunshine and +listen to the faint murmur of the little waves. + +But, if there was one drawback, she had discovered, to a morning on the +Roville plage, it was that you had a tendency to fall asleep: and this +is a degrading thing to do so soon after breakfast, even if you are on +a holiday. Usually, Sally fought stoutly against the temptation, but +to-day the sun was so warm and the whisper of the waves so insinuating +that she had almost dozed off, when she was aroused by voices close at +hand. There were many voices on the beach, both near and distant, but +these were talking English, a novelty in Roville, and the sound of the +familiar tongue jerked Sally back from the borders of sleep. A few feet +away, two men had seated themselves on the sand. + +From the first moment she had set out on her travels, it had been one of +Sally's principal amusements to examine the strangers whom chance threw +in her way and to try by the light of her intuition to fit them out with +characters and occupations: nor had she been discouraged by an almost +consistent failure to guess right. Out of the corner of her eye she +inspected these two men. + +The first of the pair did not attract her. He was a tall, dark man whose +tight, precise mouth and rather high cheeks bones gave him an appearance +vaguely sinister. He had the dusky look of the clean-shaven man whose +life is a perpetual struggle with a determined beard. He certainly +shaved twice a day, and just as certainly had the self-control not to +swear when he cut himself. She could picture him smiling nastily when +this happened. + +"Hard," diagnosed Sally. "I shouldn't like him. A lawyer or something, I +think." + +She turned to the other and found herself looking into his eyes. This +was because he had been staring at Sally with the utmost intentness ever +since his arrival. His mouth had opened slightly. He had the air of a +man who, after many disappointments, has at last found something worth +looking at. + +"Rather a dear," decided Sally. + +He was a sturdy, thick-set young man with an amiable, freckled face and +the reddest hair Sally had ever seen. He had a square chin, and at one +angle of the chin a slight cut. And Sally was convinced that, however +he had behaved on receipt of that wound, it had not been with superior +self-control. + +"A temper, I should think," she meditated. "Very quick, but soon over. +Not very clever, I should say, but nice." + +She looked away, finding his fascinated gaze a little embarrassing. + +The dark man, who in the objectionably competent fashion which, one +felt, characterized all his actions, had just succeeded in lighting +a cigarette in the teeth of a strong breeze, threw away the match and +resumed the conversation, which had presumably been interrupted by the +process of sitting down. + +"And how is Scrymgeour?" he inquired. + +"Oh, all right," replied the young man with red hair absently. Sally was +looking straight in front of her, but she felt that his eyes were still +busy. + +"I was surprised at his being here. He told me he meant to stay in +Paris." + +There was a slight pause. Sally gave the attentive poodle a piece of +nougat. + +"I say," observed the red-haired young man in clear, penetrating tones +that vibrated with intense feeling, "that's the prettiest girl I've seen +in my life!" + + + +2 + + + +At this frank revelation of the red-haired young man's personal +opinions, Sally, though considerably startled, was not displeased. A +broad-minded girl, the outburst seemed to her a legitimate comment on a +matter of public interest. The young man's companion, on the other hand, +was unmixedly shocked. + +"My dear fellow!" he ejaculated. + +"Oh, it's all right," said the red-haired young man, unmoved. "She can't +understand. There isn't a bally soul in this dashed place that can speak +a word of English. If I didn't happen to remember a few odd bits of +French, I should have starved by this time. That girl," he went on, +returning to the subject most imperatively occupying his mind, "is an +absolute topper! I give you my solemn word I've never seen anybody to +touch her. Look at those hands and feet. You don't get them outside +France. Of course, her mouth is a bit wide," he said reluctantly. + +Sally's immobility, added to the other's assurance concerning the +linguistic deficiencies of the inhabitants of Roville, seemed to +reassure the dark man. He breathed again. At no period of his life +had he ever behaved with anything but the most scrupulous correctness +himself, but he had quailed at the idea of being associated even +remotely with incorrectness in another. It had been a black moment for +him when the red-haired young man had uttered those few kind words. + +"Still you ought to be careful," he said austerely. + +He looked at Sally, who was now dividing her attention between the +poodle and a raffish-looking mongrel, who had joined the party, and +returned to the topic of the mysterious Scrymgeour. + +"How is Scrymgeour's dyspepsia?" + +The red-haired young man seemed but faintly interested in the +vicissitudes of Scrymgeour's interior. + +"Do you notice the way her hair sort of curls over her ears?" he said. +"Eh? Oh, pretty much the same, I think." + +"What hotel are you staying at?" + +"The Normandie." + +Sally, dipping into the box for another chocolate cream, gave an +imperceptible start. She, too, was staying at the Normandie. She +presumed that her admirer was a recent arrival, for she had seen nothing +of him at the hotel. + +"The Normandie?" The dark man looked puzzled. "I know Roville pretty +well by report, but I've never heard of any Hotel Normandie. Where is +it?" + +"It's a little shanty down near the station. Not much of a place. Still, +it's cheap, and the cooking's all right." + +His companion's bewilderment increased. + +"What on earth is a man like Scrymgeour doing there?" he said. Sally +was conscious of an urgent desire to know more and more about the absent +Scrymgeour. Constant repetition of his name had made him seem almost +like an old friend. "If there's one thing he's fussy about..." + +"There are at least eleven thousand things he's fussy about," +interrupted the red-haired young man disapprovingly. "Jumpy old +blighter!" + +"If there's one thing he's particular about, it's the sort of hotel +he goes to. Ever since I've known him he has always wanted the best. I +should have thought he would have gone to the Splendide." He mused on +this problem in a dissatisfied sort of way for a moment, then seemed to +reconcile himself to the fact that a rich man's eccentricities must be +humoured. "I'd like to see him again. Ask him if he will dine with me at +the Splendide to-night. Say eight sharp." + +Sally, occupied with her dogs, whose numbers had now been augmented by +a white terrier with a black patch over its left eye, could not see +the young man's face: but his voice, when he replied, told her that +something was wrong. There was a false airiness in it. + +"Oh, Scrymgeour isn't in Roville." + +"No? Where is he?" + +"Paris, I believe." + +"What!" The dark man's voice sharpened. He sounded as though he were +cross-examining a reluctant witness. "Then why aren't you there? What +are you doing here? Did he give you a holiday?" + +"Yes, he did." + +"When do you rejoin him?" + +"I don't." + +"What!" + +The red-haired young man's manner was not unmistakably dogged. + +"Well, if you want to know," he said, "the old blighter fired me the day +before yesterday." + + + +3 + + + +There was a shuffling of sand as the dark man sprang up. Sally, intent +on the drama which was unfolding itself beside her, absent-mindedly gave +the poodle a piece of nougat which should by rights have gone to the +terrier. She shot a swift glance sideways, and saw the dark man standing +in an attitude rather reminiscent of the stern father of melodrama about +to drive his erring daughter out into the snow. The red-haired young +man, outwardly stolid, was gazing before him down the beach at a fat +bather in an orange suit who, after six false starts, was now actually +in the water, floating with the dignity of a wrecked balloon. + +"Do you mean to tell me," demanded the dark man, "that, after all the +trouble the family took to get you what was practically a sinecure +with endless possibilities if you only behaved yourself, you have +deliberately thrown away..." A despairing gesture completed the +sentence. "Good God, you're hopeless!" + +The red-haired young man made no reply. He continued to gaze down the +beach. Of all outdoor sports, few are more stimulating than watching +middle-aged Frenchmen bathe. Drama, action, suspense, all are here. From +the first stealthy testing of the water with an apprehensive toe to the +final seal-like plunge, there is never a dull moment. And apart from the +excitement of the thing, judging it from a purely aesthetic standpoint, +his must be a dull soul who can fail to be uplifted by the spectacle of +a series of very stout men with whiskers, seen in tight bathing suits +against a background of brightest blue. Yet the young man with red hair, +recently in the employment of Mr. Scrymgeour, eyed this free circus +without any enjoyment whatever. + +"It's maddening! What are you going to do? What do you expect us to do? +Are we to spend our whole lives getting you positions which you won't +keep? I can tell you we're... it's monstrous! It's sickening! Good God!" + +And with these words the dark man, apparently feeling, as Sally had +sometimes felt in the society of her brother Fillmore, the futility of +mere language, turned sharply and stalked away up the beach, the dignity +of his exit somewhat marred a moment later by the fact of his straw hat +blowing off and being trodden on by a passing child. + +He left behind him the sort of electric calm which follows the falling +of a thunderbolt; that stunned calm through which the air seems still to +quiver protestingly. How long this would have lasted one cannot say: +for towards the end of the first minute it was shattered by a purely +terrestrial uproar. With an abruptness heralded only by one short, low +gurgling snarl, there sprang into being the prettiest dog fight that +Roville had seen that season. + +It was the terrier with the black patch who began it. That was Sally's +opinion: and such, one feels, will be the verdict of history. His best +friend, anxious to make out a case for him, could not have denied that +he fired the first gun of the campaign. But we must be just. The fault +was really Sally's. Absorbed in the scene which had just concluded and +acutely inquisitive as to why the shadowy Scrymgeour had seen fit to +dispense with the red-haired young man's services, she had thrice in +succession helped the poodle out of his turn. The third occasion was too +much for the terrier. + +There is about any dog fight a wild, gusty fury which affects the +average mortal with something of the helplessness induced by some vast +clashing of the elements. It seems so outside one's jurisdiction. One is +oppressed with a sense of the futility of interference. And this was no +ordinary dog fight. It was a stunning mêlée, which would have excited +favourable comment even among the blasé residents of a negro quarter or +the not easily-pleased critics of a Lancashire mining-village. From all +over the beach dogs of every size, breed, and colour were racing to the +scene: and while some of these merely remained in the ringside seats +and barked, a considerable proportion immediately started fighting one +another on general principles, well content to be in action without +bothering about first causes. The terrier had got the poodle by the +left hind-leg and was restating his war-aims. The raffish mongrel +was apparently endeavouring to fletcherize a complete stranger of the +Sealyham family. + +Sally was frankly unequal to the situation, as were the entire crowd of +spectators who had come galloping up from the water's edge. She had been +paralysed from the start. Snarling bundles bumped against her legs and +bounced away again, but she made no move. Advice in fluent French rent +the air. Arms waved, and well-filled bathing suits leaped up and down. +But nobody did anything practical until in the centre of the theatre of +war there suddenly appeared the red-haired young man. + +The only reason why dog fights do not go on for ever is that Providence +has decided that on each such occasion there shall always be among those +present one Master Mind; one wizard who, whatever his shortcomings in +other battles of life, is in this single particular sphere competent and +dominating. At Roville-sur-Mer it was the red-haired young man. His dark +companion might have turned from him in disgust: his services might not +have seemed worth retaining by the haughty Scrymgeour: he might be a +pain in the neck to "the family"; but he did know how to stop a dog +fight. From the first moment of his intervention calm began to steal +over the scene. He had the same effect on the almost inextricably +entwined belligerents as, in mediaeval legend, the Holy Grail, sliding +down the sunbeam, used to have on battling knights. He did not look like +a dove of peace, but the most captious could not have denied that he +brought home the goods. There was a magic in his soothing hands, a +spell in his voice: and in a shorter time than one would have believed +possible dog after dog had been sorted out and calmed down; until +presently all that was left of Armageddon was one solitary small Scotch +terrier, thoughtfully licking a chewed leg. The rest of the combatants, +once more in their right mind and wondering what all the fuss was about, +had been captured and haled away in a whirl of recrimination by voluble +owners. + +Having achieved this miracle, the young man turned to Sally. Gallant, +one might say reckless, as he had been a moment before, he now gave +indications of a rather pleasing shyness. He braced himself with that +painful air of effort which announces to the world that an Englishman is +about to speak a language other than his own. + +"J'espère," he said, having swallowed once or twice to brace himself up +for the journey through the jungle of a foreign tongue, "J'espère que +vous n'êtes pas--oh, dammit, what's the word--J'espère que vous n'êtes +pas blessée?" + +"Blessée?" + +"Yes, blessée. Wounded. Hurt, don't you know. Bitten. Oh, dash it. +J'espère..." + +"Oh, bitten!" said Sally, dimpling. "Oh, no, thanks very much. I wasn't +bitten. And I think it was awfully brave of you to save all our lives." + +The compliment seemed to pass over the young man's head. He stared at +Sally with horrified eyes. Over his amiable face there swept a vivid +blush. His jaw dropped. + +"Oh, my sainted aunt!" he ejaculated. + +Then, as if the situation was too much for him and flight the only +possible solution, he spun round and disappeared at a walk so rapid that +it was almost a run. Sally watched him go and was sorry that he had torn +himself away. She still wanted to know why Scrymgeour had fired him. + + + +4 + + + +Bedtime at Roville is an hour that seems to vary according to one's +proximity to the sea. The gilded palaces along the front keep deplorable +hours, polluting the night air till dawn with indefatigable jazz: but at +the pensions of the economical like the Normandie, early to bed is the +rule. True, Jules, the stout young native who combined the offices of +night-clerk and lift attendant at that establishment, was on duty in the +hall throughout the night, but few of the Normandie's patrons made use +of his services. + +Sally, entering shortly before twelve o'clock on the night of the day +on which the dark man, the red-haired young man, and their friend +Scrymgeour had come into her life, found the little hall dim and silent. +Through the iron cage of the lift a single faint bulb glowed: another, +over the desk in the far corner, illuminated the upper half of Jules, +slumbering in a chair. Jules seemed to Sally to be on duty in some +capacity or other all the time. His work, like women's, was never done. +He was now restoring his tissues with a few winks of much-needed beauty +sleep. Sally, who had been to the Casino to hear the band and afterwards +had strolled on the moonlit promenade, had a guilty sense of intrusion. + +As she stood there, reluctant to break in on Jules' rest--for her +sympathetic heart, always at the disposal of the oppressed, had long +ached for this overworked peon--she was relieved to hear footsteps in +the street outside, followed by the opening of the front door. If Jules +would have had to wake up anyway, she felt her sense of responsibility +lessened. The door, having opened, closed again with a bang. Jules +stirred, gurgled, blinked, and sat up, and Sally, turning, perceived +that the new arrival was the red-haired young man. + +"Oh, good evening," said Sally welcomingly. + +The young man stopped, and shuffled uncomfortably. The morning's +happenings were obviously still green in his memory. He had either not +ceased blushing since their last meeting or he was celebrating their +reunion by beginning to blush again: for his face was a familiar +scarlet. + +"Er--good evening," he said, disentangling his feet, which, in the +embarrassment of the moment, had somehow got coiled up together. + +"Or bon soir, I suppose you would say," murmured Sally. + +The young man acknowledged receipt of this thrust by dropping his hat +and tripping over it as he stooped to pick it up. + +Jules, meanwhile, who had been navigating in a sort of somnambulistic +trance in the neighbourhood of the lift, now threw back the cage with a +rattle. + +"It's a shame to have woken you up," said Sally, commiseratingly, +stepping in. + +Jules did not reply, for the excellent reason that he had not been +woken up. Constant practice enabled him to do this sort of work without +breaking his slumber. His brain, if you could call it that, was working +automatically. He had shut up the gate with a clang and was tugging +sluggishly at the correct rope, so that the lift was going slowly up +instead of retiring down into the basement, but he was not awake. + +Sally and the red-haired young man sat side by side on the small seat, +watching their conductor's efforts. After the first spurt, conversation +had languished. Sally had nothing of immediate interest to say, and her +companion seemed to be one of these strong, silent men you read about. +Only a slight snore from Jules broke the silence. + +At the third floor Sally leaned forward and prodded Jules in the lower +ribs. All through her stay at Roville, she had found in dealing with the +native population that actions spoke louder than words. If she wanted +anything in a restaurant or at a shop, she pointed; and, when she wished +the lift to stop, she prodded the man in charge. It was a system worth a +dozen French conversation books. + +Jules brought the machine to a halt: and it was at this point that +he should have done the one thing connected with his professional +activities which he did really well--the opening, to wit, of the iron +cage. There are ways of doing this. Jules' was the right way. He was +accustomed to do it with a flourish, and generally remarked "V'la!" in +a modest but self-congratulatory voice as though he would have liked +to see another man who could have put through a job like that. Jules' +opinion was that he might not be much to look at, but that he could open +a lift door. + +To-night, however, it seemed as if even this not very exacting feat was +beyond his powers. Instead of inserting his key in the lock, he stood +staring in an attitude of frozen horror. He was a man who took most +things in life pretty seriously, and whatever was the little difficulty +just now seemed to have broken him all up. + +"There appears," said Sally, turning to her companion, "to be a hitch. +Would you mind asking what's the matter? I don't know any French myself +except 'oo la la!'" + +The young man, thus appealed to, nerved himself to the task. He eyed the +melancholy Jules doubtfully, and coughed in a strangled sort of way. + +"Oh, esker... esker vous..." + +"Don't weaken," said Sally. "I think you've got him going." + +"Esker vous... Pourquoi vous ne... I mean ne vous... that is to say, +quel est le raison..." + +He broke off here, because at this point Jules began to explain. He +explained very rapidly and at considerable length. The fact that neither +of his hearers understood a word of what he was saying appeared not +to have impressed itself upon him. Or, if he gave a thought to it, +he dismissed the objection as trifling. He wanted to explain, and he +explained. Words rushed from him like water from a geyser. Sounds which +you felt you would have been able to put a meaning to if he had detached +them from the main body and repeated them slowly, went swirling down the +stream and were lost for ever. + +"Stop him!" said Sally firmly. + +The red-haired young man looked as a native of Johnstown might have +looked on being requested to stop that city's celebrated flood. + +"Stop him?" + +"Yes. Blow a whistle or something." + +Out of the depths of the young man's memory there swam to the surface +a single word--a word which he must have heard somewhere or read +somewhere: a legacy, perhaps, from long-vanished school-days. + +"Zut!" he barked, and instantaneously Jules turned himself off at the +main. There was a moment of dazed silence, such as might occur in a +boiler-factory if the works suddenly shut down. + +"Quick! Now you've got him!" cried Sally. "Ask him what he's talking +about--if he knows, which I doubt--and tell him to speak slowly. Then we +shall get somewhere." + +The young man nodded intelligently. The advice was good. + +"Lentement," he said. "Parlez lentement. Pas si--you know what I +mean--pas si dashed vite!" + +"Ah-a-ah!" cried Jules, catching the idea on the fly. "Lentement. Ah, +oui, lentement." + +There followed a lengthy conversation which, while conveying nothing to +Sally, seemed intelligible to the red-haired linguist. + +"The silly ass," he was able to announce some few minutes later, "has +made a bloomer. Apparently he was half asleep when we came in, and he +shoved us into the lift and slammed the door, forgetting that he had +left the keys on the desk." + +"I see," said Sally. "So we're shut in?" + +"I'm afraid so. I wish to goodness," said the young man, "I knew French +well. I'd curse him with some vim and not a little animation, the chump! +I wonder what 'blighter' is in French," he said, meditating. + +"It's the merest suggestion," said Sally, "but oughtn't we to do +something?" + +"What could we do?" + +"Well, for one thing, we might all utter a loud yell. It would scare +most of the people in the hotel to death, but there might be a survivor +or two who would come and investigate and let us out." + +"What a ripping idea!" said the young man, impressed. + +"I'm glad you like it. Now tell him the main out-line, or he'll think +we've gone mad." + +The young man searched for words, and eventually found some which +expressed his meaning lamely but well enough to cause Jules to nod in a +depressed sort of way. + +"Fine!" said Sally. "Now, all together at the word 'three.' +One--two--Oh, poor darling!" she broke off. "Look at him!" + +In the far corner of the lift, the emotional Jules was sobbing silently +into the bunch of cotton-waste which served him in the office of a +pocket-handkerchief. His broken-hearted gulps echoed hollowly down the +shaft. + + + +5 + + + +In these days of cheap books of instruction on every subject under the +sun, we most of us know how to behave in the majority of life's little +crises. We have only ourselves to blame if we are ignorant of what to +do before the doctor comes, of how to make a dainty winter coat for baby +out of father's last year's under-vest and of the best method of coping +with the cold mutton. But nobody yet has come forward with practical +advice as to the correct method of behaviour to be adopted when +a lift-attendant starts crying. And Sally and her companion, as a +consequence, for a few moments merely stared at each other helplessly. + +"Poor darling!" said Sally, finding speech. "Ask him what's the matter." + +The young man looked at her doubtfully. + +"You know," he said, "I don't enjoy chatting with this blighter. I mean +to say, it's a bit of an effort. I don't know why it is, but talking +French always makes me feel as if my nose were coming off. Couldn't we +just leave him to have his cry out by himself?" + +"The idea!" said Sally. "Have you no heart? Are you one of those fiends +in human shape?" + +He turned reluctantly to Jules, and paused to overhaul his vocabulary. + +"You ought to be thankful for this chance," said Sally. "It's the only +real way of learning French, and you're getting a lesson for nothing. +What did he say then?" + +"Something about losing something, it seemed to me. I thought I caught +the word perdu." + +"But that means a partridge, doesn't it? I'm sure I've seen it on the +menus." + +"Would he talk about partridges at a time like this?" + +"He might. The French are extraordinary people." + +"Well, I'll have another go at him. But he's a difficult chap to chat +with. If you give him the least encouragement, he sort of goes off like +a rocket." He addressed another question to the sufferer, and listened +attentively to the voluble reply. + +"Oh!" he said with sudden enlightenment. "Your job?" He turned to Sally. +"I got it that time," he said. "The trouble is, he says, that if we yell +and rouse the house, we'll get out all right, but he will lose his job, +because this is the second time this sort of thing has happened, and +they warned him last time that once more would mean the push." + +"Then we mustn't dream of yelling," said Sally, decidedly. "It means +a pretty long wait, you know. As far as I can gather, there's just a +chance of somebody else coming in later, in which case he could let +us out. But it's doubtful. He rather thinks that everybody has gone to +roost." + +"Well, we must try it. I wouldn't think of losing the poor man his job. +Tell him to take the car down to the ground-floor, and then we'll just +sit and amuse ourselves till something happens. We've lots to talk +about. We can tell each other the story of our lives." + +Jules, cheered by his victims' kindly forbearance, lowered the car to +the ground floor, where, after a glance of infinite longing at the keys +on the distant desk, the sort of glance which Moses must have cast at +the Promised Land from the summit of Mount Pisgah, he sagged down in a +heap and resumed his slumbers. Sally settled herself as comfortably as +possible in her corner. + +"You'd better smoke," she said. "It will be something to do." + +"Thanks awfully." + +"And now," said Sally, "tell me why Scrymgeour fired you." + +Little by little, under the stimulating influence of this nocturnal +adventure, the red-haired young man had lost that shy confusion which +had rendered him so ill at ease when he had encountered Sally in the +hall of the hotel; but at this question embarrassment gripped him once +more. Another of those comprehensive blushes of his raced over his face, +and he stammered. + +"I say, I'm glad... I'm fearfully sorry about that, you know!" + +"About Scrymgeour?" + +"You know what I mean. I mean, about making such a most ghastly ass of +myself this morning. I... I never dreamed you understood English." + +"Why, I didn't object. I thought you were very nice and complimentary. +Of course, I don't know how many girls you've seen in your life, but..." + +"No, I say, don't! It makes me feel such a chump." + +"And I'm sorry about my mouth. It is wide. But I know you're a +fair-minded man and realize that it isn't my fault." + +"Don't rub it in," pleaded the young man. "As a matter of fact, if you +want to know, I think your mouth is absolutely perfect. I think," he +proceeded, a little feverishly, "that you are the most indescribable +topper that ever..." + +"You were going to tell me about Scrymgeour," said Sally. + +The young man blinked as if he had collided with some hard object while +sleep-walking. Eloquence had carried him away. + +"Scrymgeour?" he said. "Oh, that would bore you." + +"Don't be silly," said Sally reprovingly. "Can't you realize that we're +practically castaways on a desert island? There's nothing to do till +to-morrow but talk about ourselves. I want to hear all about you, +and then I'll tell you all about myself. If you feel diffident about +starting the revelations, I'll begin. Better start with names. Mine is +Sally Nicholas. What's yours?" + +"Mine? Oh, ah, yes, I see what you mean." + +"I thought you would. I put it as clearly as I could. Well, what is it?" + +"Kemp." + +"And the first name?" + +"Well, as a matter of fact," said the young man, "I've always rather +hushed up my first name, because when I was christened they worked a +low-down trick on me!" + +"You can't shock me," said Sally, encouragingly. "My father's name was +Ezekiel, and I've a brother who was christened Fillmore." + +Mr. Kemp brightened. "Well, mine isn't as bad as that... No, I don't +mean that," he broke off apologetically. "Both awfully jolly names, of +course..." + +"Get on," said Sally. + +"Well, they called me Lancelot. And, of course, the thing is that I +don't look like a Lancelot and never shall. My pals," he added in a more +cheerful strain, "call me Ginger." + +"I don't blame them," said Sally. + +"Perhaps you wouldn't mind thinking of me as Ginger?'' suggested the +young man diffidently. + +"Certainly." + +"That's awfully good of you." + +"Not at all." + +Jules stirred in his sleep and grunted. No other sound came to disturb +the stillness of the night. + +"You were going to tell me about yourself?" said Mr. Lancelot (Ginger) +Kemp. + +"I'm going to tell you all about myself," said Sally, "not because I +think it will interest you..." + +"Oh, it will!" + +"Not, I say, because I think it will interest you..." + +"It will, really." + +Sally looked at him coldly. + +"Is this a duet?" she inquired, "or have I the floor?" + +"I'm awfully sorry." + +"Not, I repeat for the third time, because I think It will interest you, +but because if I do you won't have any excuse for not telling me your +life-history, and you wouldn't believe how inquisitive I am. Well, in +the first place, I live in America. I'm over here on a holiday. And it's +the first real holiday I've had in three years--since I left home, in +fact." Sally paused. "I ran away from home," she said. + +"Good egg!" said Ginger Kemp. + +"I beg your pardon?" + +"I mean, quite right. I bet you were quite right." + +"When I say home," Sally went on, "it was only a sort of imitation +home, you know. One of those just-as-good homes which are never as +satisfactory as the real kind. My father and mother both died a good +many years ago. My brother and I were dumped down on the reluctant +doorstep of an uncle." + +"Uncles," said Ginger Kemp, feelingly, "are the devil. I've got an... +but I'm interrupting you." + +"My uncle was our trustee. He had control of all my brother's money +and mine till I was twenty-one. My brother was to get his when he was +twenty-five. My poor father trusted him blindly, and what do you think +happened?" + +"Good Lord! The blighter embezzled the lot?" + +"No, not a cent. Wasn't it extraordinary! Have you ever heard of a +blindly trusted uncle who was perfectly honest? Well, mine was. But the +trouble was that, while an excellent man to have looking after one's +money, he wasn't a very lovable character. He was very hard. Hard! +He was as hard as--well, nearly as hard as this seat. He hated poor +Fill..." + +"Phil?" + +"I broke it to you just now that my brother's name was Fillmore." + +"Oh, your brother. Oh, ah, yes." + +"He was always picking on poor Fill. And I'm bound to say that Fill +rather laid himself out as what you might call a pickee. He was always +getting into trouble. One day, about three years ago, he was expelled +from Harvard, and my uncle vowed he would have nothing more to do with +him. So I said, if Fill left, I would leave. And, as this seemed to be +my uncle's idea of a large evening, no objection was raised, and Fill +and I departed. We went to New York, and there we've been ever since. +About six months' ago Fill passed the twenty-five mark and collected his +money, and last month I marched past the given point and got mine. So it +all ends happily, you see. Now tell me about yourself." + +"But, I say, you know, dash it, you've skipped a lot. I mean to say, you +must have had an awful time in New York, didn't you? How on earth did +you get along?" + +"Oh, we found work. My brother tried one or two things, and finally +became an assistant stage-manager with some theatre people. The only +thing I could do, having been raised in enervating luxury, was ballroom +dancing, so I ball-room danced. I got a job at a place in Broadway +called 'The Flower Garden' as what is humorously called an +'instructress,' as if anybody could 'instruct' the men who came there. +One was lucky if one saved one's life and wasn't quashed to death." + +"How perfectly foul!" + +"Oh, I don't know. It was rather fun for a while. Still," said Sally, +meditatively, "I'm not saying I could have held out much longer: I was +beginning to give. I suppose I've been trampled underfoot by more fat +men than any other girl of my age in America. I don't know why it was, +but every man who came in who was a bit overweight seemed to make for me +by instinct. That's why I like to sit on the sands here and watch +these Frenchmen bathing. It's just heavenly to lie back and watch a two +hundred and fifty pound man, coming along and feel that he isn't going +to dance with me." + +"But, I say! How absolutely rotten it must have been for you!" + +"Well, I'll tell you one thing. It's going to make me a very +domesticated wife one of these days. You won't find me gadding about in +gilded jazz-palaces! For me, a little place in the country somewhere, +with my knitting and an Elsie book, and bed at half-past nine! And now +tell me the story of your life. And make it long because I'm perfectly +certain there's going to be no relief-expedition. I'm sure the last +dweller under this roof came in years ago. We shall be here till +morning." + +"I really think we had better shout, you know." + +"And lose Jules his job? Never!" + +"Well, of course, I'm sorry for poor old Jules' troubles, but I hate to +think of you having to..." + +"Now get on with the story," said Sally. + + + +6 + + + +Ginger Kemp exhibited some of the symptoms of a young bridegroom called +upon at a wedding-breakfast to respond to the toast. He moved his feet +restlessly and twisted his fingers. + +"I hate talking about myself, you know," he said. + +"So I supposed," said Sally. "That's why I gave you my autobiography +first, to give you no chance of backing out. Don't be such a shrinking +violet. We're all shipwrecked mariners here. I am intensely interested +in your narrative. And, even if I wasn't, I'd much rather listen to it +than to Jules' snoring." + +"He is snoring a bit, what? Does it annoy you? Shall I stir him?" + +"You seem to have an extraordinary brutal streak in your nature," said +Sally. "You appear to think of nothing else but schemes for harassing +poor Jules. Leave him alone for a second, and start telling me about +yourself." + +"Where shall I start?" + +"Well, not with your childhood, I think. We'll skip that." + +"Well..." Ginger Kemp knitted his brow, searching for a dramatic +opening. "Well, I'm more or less what you might call an orphan, like +you. I mean to say, both my people are dead and all that sort of thing." + +"Thanks for explaining. That has made it quite clear." + +"I can't remember my mother. My father died when I was in my last +year at Cambridge. I'd been having a most awfully good time at the +'varsity,'" said Ginger, warming to his theme. "Not thick, you know, but +good. I'd got my rugger and boxing blues and I'd just been picked for +scrum-half for England against the North in the first trial match, and +between ourselves it really did look as if I was more or less of a snip +for my international." + +Sally gazed at him wide eyed. + +"Is that good or bad?" she asked. + +"Eh?" + +"Are you reciting a catalogue of your crimes, or do you expect me to get +up and cheer? What is a rugger blue, to start with?" + +"Well, it's... it's a rugger blue, you know." + +"Oh, I see," said Sally. "You mean a rugger blue." + +"I mean to say, I played rugger--footer--that's to say, football--Rugby +football--for Cambridge, against Oxford. I was scrum-half." + +"And what is a scrum-half?" asked Sally, patiently. "Yes, I know you're +going to say it's a scrum-half, but can't you make it easier?" + +"The scrum-half," said Ginger, "is the half who works the scrum. He +slings the pill out to the fly-half, who starts the three-quarters +going. I don't know if you understand?" + +"I don't." + +"It's dashed hard to explain," said Ginger Kemp, unhappily. "I mean, +I don't think I've ever met anyone before who didn't know what a +scrum-half was." + +"Well, I can see that it has something to do with football, so we'll +leave it at that. I suppose it's something like our quarter-back. And +what's an international?" + +"It's called getting your international when you play for England, you +know. England plays Wales, France, Ireland, and Scotland. If it hadn't +been for the smash, I think I should have played for England against +Wales." + +"I see at last. What you're trying to tell me is that you were very good +at football." + +Ginger Kemp blushed warmly. + +"Oh, I don't say that. England was pretty short of scrum-halves that +year." + +"What a horrible thing to happen to a country! Still, you were likely +to be picked on the All-England team when the smash came? What was the +smash?" + +"Well, it turned out that the poor old pater hadn't left a penny. I +never understood the process exactly, but I'd always supposed that we +were pretty well off; and then it turned out that I hadn't anything at +all. I'm bound to say it was a bit of a jar. I had to come down from +Cambridge and go to work in my uncle's office. Of course, I made an +absolute hash of it." + +"Why, of course?" + +"Well, I'm not a very clever sort of chap, you see. I somehow didn't +seem able to grasp the workings. After about a year, my uncle, getting +a bit fed-up, hoofed me out and got me a mastership at a school, and I +made a hash of that. He got me one or two other jobs, and I made a hash +of those." + +"You certainly do seem to be one of our most prominent young hashers!" +gasped Sally. + +"I am," said Ginger, modestly. + +There was a silence. + +"And what about Scrymgeour?" Sally asked. + +"That was the last of the jobs," said Ginger. "Scrymgeour is a pompous +old ass who thinks he's going to be Prime Minister some day. He's a big +bug at the Bar and has just got into Parliament. My cousin used to devil +for him. That's how I got mixed up with the blighter." + +"Your cousin used...? I wish you would talk English." + +"That was my cousin who was with me on the beach this morning." + +"And what did you say he used to do for Mr. Scrymgeour?" + +"Oh, it's called devilling. My cousin's at the Bar, too--one of our +rising nibs, as a matter of fact..." + +"I thought he was a lawyer of some kind." + +"He's got a long way beyond it now, but when he started he used to devil +for Scrymgeour--assist him, don't you know. His name's Carmyle, you +know. Perhaps you've heard of him? He's rather a prominent johnny in his +way. Bruce Carmyle, you know." + +"I haven't." + +"Well, he got me this job of secretary to Scrymgeour." + +"And why did Mr. Scrymgeour fire you?" + +Ginger Kemp's face darkened. He frowned. Sally, watching him, felt that +she had been right when she had guessed that he had a temper. She liked +him none the worse for it. Mild men did not appeal to her. + +"I don't know if you're fond of dogs?" said Ginger. + +"I used to be before this morning," said Sally. "And I suppose I shall +be again in time. For the moment I've had what you might call rather a +surfeit of dogs. But aren't you straying from the point? I asked you why +Mr. Scrymgeour dismissed you." + +"I'm telling you." + +"I'm glad of that. I didn't know." + +"The old brute," said Ginger, frowning again, "has a dog. A very jolly +little spaniel. Great pal of mine. And Scrymgeour is the sort of fool +who oughtn't to be allowed to own a dog. He's one of those asses who +isn't fit to own a dog. As a matter of fact, of all the blighted, +pompous, bullying, shrivelled-souled old devils..." + +"One moment," said Sally. "I'm getting an impression that you don't like +Mr. Scrymgeour. Am I right?" + +"Yes!" + +"I thought so. Womanly intuition! Go on." + +"He used to insist on the poor animal doing tricks. I hate seeing a +dog do tricks. Dogs loathe it, you know. They're frightfully sensitive. +Well, Scrymgeour used to make this spaniel of his do tricks--fool-things +that no self-respecting dogs would do: and eventually poor old Billy got +fed up and jibbed. He was too polite to bite, but he sort of shook his +head and crawled under a chair. You'd have thought anyone would have +let it go at that, but would old Scrymgeour? Not a bit of it! Of all the +poisonous..." + +"Yes, I know. Go on." + +"Well, the thing ended in the blighter hauling him out from under the +chair and getting more and more shirty, until finally he laid into him +with a stick. That is to say," said Ginger, coldly accurate, "he started +laying into him with a stick." He brooded for a moment with knit brows. +"A spaniel, mind you! Can you imagine anyone beating a spaniel? It's +like hitting a little girl. Well, he's a fairly oldish man, you know, +and that hampered me a bit: but I got hold of the stick and broke it +into about eleven pieces, and by great good luck it was a stick he +happened to value rather highly. It had a gold knob and had been +presented to him by his constituents or something. I minced it up +a goodish bit, and then I told him a fair amount about himself. And +then--well, after that he shot me out, and I came here." + +Sally did not speak for a moment. + +"You were quite right," she said at last, in a sober voice that had +nothing in it of her customary flippancy. She paused again. "And what +are you going to do now?" she said. + +"I don't know." + +"You'll get something?" + +"Oh, yes, I shall get something, I suppose. The family will be pretty +sick, of course." + +"For goodness' sake! Why do you bother about the family?" Sally burst +out. She could not reconcile this young man's flabby dependence on his +family with the enterprise and vigour which he had shown in his dealings +with the unspeakable Scrymgeour. Of course, he had been brought up to +look on himself as a rich man's son and appeared to have drifted as such +young men are wont to do; but even so... "The whole trouble with you," +she said, embarking on a subject on which she held strong views, "is +that..." + +Her harangue was interrupted by what--at the Normandie, at one o'clock +in the morning--practically amounted to a miracle. The front door of +the hotel opened, and there entered a young man in evening dress. +Such persons were sufficiently rare at the Normandie, which catered +principally for the staid and middle-aged, and this youth's presence was +due, if one must pause to explain it, to the fact that, in the middle +of his stay at Roville, a disastrous evening at the Casino had so +diminished his funds that he had been obliged to make a hurried shift +from the Hotel Splendide to the humbler Normandie. His late appearance +to-night was caused by the fact that he had been attending a dance +at the Splendide, principally in the hope of finding there some +kind-hearted friend of his prosperity from whom he might borrow. + +A rapid-fire dialogue having taken place between Jules and the newcomer, +the keys were handed through the cage, the door opened and the lift was +set once more in motion. And a few minutes later, Sally, suddenly aware +of an overpowering sleepiness, had switched off her light and jumped +into bed. Her last waking thought was a regret that she had not been +able to speak at length to Mr. Ginger Kemp on the subject of enterprise, +and resolve that the address should be delivered at the earliest +opportunity. + + + + +CHAPTER III. THE DIGNIFIED MR. CARMYLE + + + +1 + + + +By six o'clock on the following evening, however, Sally had been forced +to the conclusion that Ginger would have to struggle through life as +best he could without the assistance of her contemplated remarks: for +she had seen nothing of him all day and in another hour she would have +left Roville on the seven-fifteen express which was to take her to +Paris, en route for Cherbourg and the liner whereon she had booked her +passage for New York. + +It was in the faint hope of finding him even now that, at half-past six, +having conveyed her baggage to the station and left it in charge of +an amiable porter, she paid a last visit to the Casino Municipale. She +disliked the thought of leaving Ginger without having uplifted him. Like +so many alert and active-minded girls, she possessed in a great degree +the quality of interesting herself in--or, as her brother Fillmore +preferred to put it, messing about with--the private affairs of others. +Ginger had impressed her as a man to whom it was worth while to give a +friendly shove on the right path; and it was with much gratification, +therefore, that, having entered the Casino, she perceived a flaming +head shining through the crowd which had gathered at one of the +roulette-tables. + +There are two Casinos at Roville-sur-Mer. The one on the Promenade goes +in mostly for sea-air and a mild game called boule. It is the big Casino +Municipale down in the Palace Massena near the railway station which is +the haunt of the earnest gambler who means business; and it was plain to +Sally directly she arrived that Ginger Kemp not only meant business +but was getting results. Ginger was going extremely strong. He was +entrenched behind an opulent-looking mound of square counters: and, even +as Sally looked, a wooden-faced croupier shoved a further instalment +across the table to him at the end of his long rake. + +"Epatant!" murmured a wistful man at Sally's side, removing an elbow +from her ribs in order the better to gesticulate. Sally, though no French +scholar, gathered that he was startled and gratified. The entire crowd +seemed to be startled and gratified. There is undoubtedly a +certain altruism in the make-up of the spectators at a Continental +roulette-table. They seem to derive a spiritual pleasure from seeing +somebody else win. + +The croupier gave his moustache a twist with his left hand and the wheel +a twist with his right, and silence fell again. Sally, who had shifted +to a spot where the pressure of the crowd was less acute, was now able +to see Ginger's face, and as she saw it she gave an involuntary laugh. +He looked exactly like a dog at a rat-hole. His hair seemed to bristle +with excitement. One could almost fancy that his ears were pricked up. + +In the tense hush which had fallen on the crowd at the restarting of the +wheel, Sally's laugh rang out with an embarrassing clearness. It had a +marked effect on all those within hearing. There is something almost of +religious ecstasy in the deportment of the spectators at a table where +anyone is having a run of luck at roulette, and if she had guffawed in +a cathedral she could not have caused a more pained consternation. The +earnest worshippers gazed at her with shocked eyes, and Ginger, turning +with a start, saw her and jumped up. As he did so, the ball fell with a +rattling click into a red compartment of the wheel; and, as it ceased to +revolve and it was seen that at last the big winner had picked the wrong +colour, a shuddering groan ran through the congregation like that which +convulses the penitents' bench at a negro revival meeting. More +glances of reproach were cast at Sally. It was generally felt that her +injudicious behaviour had changed Ginger's luck. + +The only person who did not appear to be concerned was Ginger himself. +He gathered up his loot, thrust it into his pocket, and elbowed his +way to where Sally stood, now definitely established in the eyes of the +crowd as a pariah. There was universal regret that he had decided to +call it a day. It was to the spectators as though a star had suddenly +walked off the stage in the middle of his big scene; and not even a loud +and violent quarrel which sprang up at this moment between two excitable +gamblers over a disputed five-franc counter could wholly console them. + +"I say," said Ginger, dexterously plucking Sally out of the crowd, +"this is topping, meeting you like this. I've been looking for you +everywhere." + +"It's funny you didn't find me, then, for that's where I've been. I was +looking for you." + +"No, really?" Ginger seemed pleased. He led the way to the quiet +ante-room outside the gambling-hall, and they sat down in a corner. +It was pleasant here, with nobody near except the gorgeously uniformed +attendant over by the door. "That was awfully good of you." + +"I felt I must have a talk with you before my train went." + +Ginger started violently. + +"Your train? What do you mean?" + +"The puff-puff," explained Sally. "I'm leaving to-night, you know." + +"Leaving?" Ginger looked as horrified as the devoutest of the +congregation of which Sally had just ceased to be a member. "You don't +mean leaving? You're not going away from Roville?" + +"I'm afraid so." + +"But why? Where are you going?" + +"Back to America. My boat sails from Cherbourg tomorrow." + +"Oh, my aunt!" + +"I'm sorry," said Sally, touched by his concern. She was a warm-hearted +girl and liked being appreciated. "But..." + +"I say..." Ginger Kemp turned bright scarlet and glared before him at +the uniformed official, who was regarding their tête-à-tête with the +indulgent eye of one who has been through this sort of thing himself. "I +say, look here, will you marry me?" + + + +2 + + + +Sally stared at his vermilion profile in frank amazement. Ginger, she +had realized by this time, was in many ways a surprising young man, but +she had not expected him to be as surprising as this. + +"Marry you!" + +"You know what I mean." + +"Well, yes, I suppose I do. You allude to the holy state. Yes, I know +what you mean." + +"Then how about it?" + +Sally began to regain her composure. Her sense of humour was tickled. +She looked at Ginger gravely. He did not meet her eye, but continued to +drink in the uniformed official, who was by now so carried away by +the romance of it all that he had begun to hum a love-ballad under his +breath. The official could not hear what they were saying, and would not +have been able to understand it even if he could have heard; but he was +an expert in the language of the eyes. + +"But isn't this--don't think I am trying to make difficulties--isn't +this a little sudden?" + +"It's got to be sudden," said Ginger Kemp, complainingly. "I thought you +were going to be here for weeks." + +"But, my infant, my babe, has it occurred to you that we are practically +strangers?" She patted his hand tolerantly, causing the uniformed +official to heave a tender sigh. "I see what has happened," she said. +"You're mistaking me for some other girl, some girl you know really +well, and were properly introduced to. Take a good look at me, and +you'll see." + +"If I take a good look at you," said Ginger, feverishly, "I'm dashed if +I'll answer for the consequences." + +"And this is the man I was going to lecture on 'Enterprise.'" + +"You're the most wonderful girl I've ever met, dash it!" said Ginger, +his gaze still riveted on the official by the door "I dare say it is +sudden. I can't help that. I fell in love with you the moment I saw you, +and there you are!" + +"But..." + +"Now, look here, I know I'm not much of a chap and all that, but... +well, I've just won the deuce of a lot of money in there..." + +"Would you buy me with your gold?" + +"I mean to say, we should have enough to start on, and... of course I've +made an infernal hash of everything I've tried up till now, but there +must be something I can do, and you can jolly well bet I'd have a +goodish stab at it. I mean to say, with you to buck me up and so forth, +don't you know. Well, I mean..." + +"Has it struck you that I may already be engaged to someone else?" + +"Oh, golly! Are you?" + +For the first time he turned and faced her, and there was a look in his +eyes which touched Sally and drove all sense of the ludicrous out of +her. Absurd as it was, this man was really serious. + +"Well, yes, as a matter of fact I am," she said soberly. + +Ginger Kemp bit his lip and for a moment was silent. + +"Oh, well, that's torn it!" he said at last. + +Sally was aware of an emotion too complex to analyse. There was pity in +it, but amusement too. The emotion, though she did not recognize it, was +maternal. Mothers, listening to their children pleading with engaging +absurdity for something wholly out of their power to bestow, feel that +same wavering between tears and laughter. Sally wanted to pick Ginger up +and kiss him. The one thing she could not do was to look on him, sorry +as she was for him, as a reasonable, grown-up man. + +"You don't really mean it, you know." + +"Don't I!" said Ginger, hollowly. "Oh, don't I!" + +"You can't! There isn't such a thing in real life as love at first +sight. Love's a thing that comes when you know a person well and..." +She paused. It had just occurred to her that she was hardly the girl to +lecture in this strain. Her love for Gerald Foster had been sufficiently +sudden, even instantaneous. What did she know of Gerald except that +she loved him? They had become engaged within two weeks of their first +meeting. She found this recollection damping to her eloquence, and ended +by saying tamely: + +"It's ridiculous." + +Ginger had simmered down to a mood of melancholy resignation. + +"I couldn't have expected you to care for me, I suppose, anyway," he +said, sombrely. "I'm not much of a chap." + +It was just the diversion from the theme under discussion which Sally +had been longing to find. She welcomed the chance of continuing the +conversation on a less intimate and sentimental note. + +"That's exactly what I wanted to talk to you about," she said, seizing +the opportunity offered by this display of humility. "I've been looking +for you all day to go on with what I was starting to say in the lift +last night when we were interrupted. Do you mind if I talk to you like +an aunt--or a sister, suppose we say? Really, the best plan would be for +you to adopt me as an honorary sister. What do you think?" + +Ginger did not appear noticeably elated at the suggested relationship. + +"Because I really do take a tremendous interest in you." + +Ginger brightened. "That's awfully good of you." + +"I'm going to speak words of wisdom. Ginger, why don't you brace up?" + +"Brace up?" + +"Yes, stiffen your backbone and stick out your chin, and square your +elbows, and really amount to something. Why do you simply flop about and +do nothing and leave everything to what you call 'the family'? Why do +you have to be helped all the time? Why don't you help yourself? Why do +you have to have jobs found for you? Why don't you rush out and get one? +Why do you have to worry about what, 'the family' thinks of you? Why +don't you make yourself independent of them? I know you had hard luck, +suddenly finding yourself without money and all that, but, good heavens, +everybody else in the world who has ever done anything has been broke at +one time or another. It's part of the fun. You'll never get anywhere +by letting yourself be picked up by the family like... like a floppy +Newfoundland puppy and dumped down in any old place that happens to +suit them. A job's a thing you've got to choose for yourself and get for +yourself. Think what you can do--there must be something--and then go +at it with a snort and grab it and hold it down and teach it to take +a joke. You've managed to collect some money. It will give you time +to look round. And, when you've had a look round, do something! Try to +realize you're alive, and try to imagine the family isn't!" + +Sally stopped and drew a deep breath. Ginger Kemp did not reply for a +moment. He seemed greatly impressed. + +"When you talk quick," he said at length, in a serious meditative voice, +"your nose sort of goes all squiggly. Ripping, it looks!" + +Sally uttered an indignant cry. + +"Do you mean to say you haven't been listening to a word I've been +saying," she demanded. + +"Oh, rather! Oh, by Jove, yes." + +"Well, what did I say?" + +"You... er... And your eyes sort of shine, too." + +"Never mind my eyes. What did I say?" + +"You told me," said Ginger, on reflection, "to get a job." + +"Well, yes. I put it much better than that, but that's what it amounted +to, I suppose. All right, then. I'm glad you..." + +Ginger was eyeing her with mournful devotion. "I say," he interrupted, +"I wish you'd let me write to you. Letters, I mean, and all that. I have +an idea it would kind of buck me up." + +"You won't have time for writing letters." + +"I'll have time to write them to you. You haven't an address or anything +of that sort in America, have you, by any chance? I mean, so that I'd +know where to write to." + +"I can give you an address which will always find me." She told him the +number and street of Mrs. Meecher's boarding-house, and he wrote them +down reverently on his shirt-cuff. "Yes, on second thoughts, do write," +she said. "Of course, I shall want to know how you've got on. I... oh, +my goodness! That clock's not right?" + +"Just about. What time does your train go?" + +"Go! It's gone! Or, at least, it goes in about two seconds." She made a +rush for the swing-door, to the confusion of the uniformed official who +had not been expecting this sudden activity. "Good-bye, Ginger. Write to +me, and remember what I said." + +Ginger, alert after his unexpected fashion when it became a question +of physical action, had followed her through the swing-door, and they +emerged together and started running down the square. + +"Stick it!" said Ginger, encouragingly. He was running easily and well, +as becomes a man who, in his day, had been a snip for his international +at scrum-half. + +Sally saved her breath. The train was beginning to move slowly out of +the station as they sprinted abreast on to the platform. Ginger dived +for the nearest door, wrenched it open, gathered Sally neatly in his +arms, and flung her in. She landed squarely on the toes of a man who +occupied the corner seat, and, bounding off again, made for the window. +Ginger, faithful to the last, was trotting beside the train as it +gathered speed. + +"Ginger! My poor porter! Tip him. I forgot." + +"Right ho!" + +"And don't forget what I've been saying." + +"Right ho!" + +"Look after yourself and 'Death to the Family!'" + +"Right ho!" + +The train passed smoothly out of the station. Sally cast one last look +back at her red-haired friend, who had now halted and was waving a +handkerchief. Then she turned to apologize to the other occupant of the +carriage. + +"I'm so sorry," she said, breathlessly. "I hope I didn't hurt you." + +She found herself facing Ginger's cousin, the dark man of yesterday's +episode on the beach, Bruce Carmyle. + + + +3 + + + +Mr. Carmyle was not a man who readily allowed himself to be disturbed +by life's little surprises, but at the present moment he could not help +feeling slightly dazed. He recognized Sally now as the French girl who +had attracted his cousin Lancelot's notice on the beach. At least he had +assumed that she was French, and it was startling to be addressed by +her now in fluent English. How had she suddenly acquired this gift of +tongues? And how on earth had she had time since yesterday, when he +had been a total stranger to her, to become sufficiently intimate with +Cousin Lancelot to be sprinting with him down station platforms and +addressing him out of railway-carriage windows as Ginger? Bruce Carmyle +was aware that most members of that sub-species of humanity, his +cousin's personal friends, called him by that familiar--and, so Carmyle +held, vulgar--nickname: but how had this girl got hold of it? + +If Sally had been less pretty, Mr. Carmyle would undoubtedly have looked +disapprovingly at her, for she had given his rather rigid sense of the +proprieties a nasty jar. But as, panting and flushed from her run, she +was prettier than any girl he had yet met, he contrived to smile. + +"Not at all," he said in answer to her question, though it was far from +the truth. His left big toe was aching confoundedly. Even a girl with +a foot as small as Sally's can make her presence felt on a man's toe if +the scrum-half who is handling her aims well and uses plenty of vigour. + +"If you don't mind," said Sally, sitting down, "I think I'll breathe a +little." + +She breathed. The train sped on. + +"Quite a close thing," said Bruce Carmyle, affably. The pain in his toe +was diminishing. "You nearly missed it." + +"Yes. It was lucky Mr. Kemp was with me. He throws very straight, +doesn't he." + +"Tell me," said Carmyle, "how do you come to know my Cousin? On the +beach yesterday morning..." + +"Oh, we didn't know each other then. But we were staying at the same +hotel, and we spent an hour or so shut up in an elevator together. That +was when we really got acquainted." + +A waiter entered the compartment, announcing in unexpected English that +dinner was served in the restaurant car. "Would you care for dinner?" + +"I'm starving," said Sally. + +She reproved herself, as they made their way down the corridor, for +being so foolish as to judge anyone by his appearance. This man was +perfectly pleasant in spite of his grim exterior. She had decided by the +time they had seated themselves at the table she liked him. + +At the table, however, Mr. Carmyle's manner changed for the worse. He +lost his amiability. He was evidently a man who took his meals seriously +and believed in treating waiters with severity. He shuddered austerely +at a stain on the table-cloth, and then concentrated himself frowningly +on the bill of fare. Sally, meanwhile, was establishing cosy relations +with the much too friendly waiter, a cheerful old man who from the start +seemed to have made up his mind to regard her as a favourite daughter. +The waiter talked no English and Sally no French, but they were getting +along capitally, when Mr. Carmyle, who had been irritably waving aside +the servitor's light-hearted advice--at the Hotel Splendide the waiters +never bent over you and breathed cordial suggestions down the side of +your face--gave his order crisply in the Anglo-Gallic dialect of the +travelling Briton. The waiter remarked, "Boum!" in a pleased sort of +way, and vanished. + +"Nice old man!" said Sally. + +"Infernally familiar!" said Mr. Carmyle. + +Sally perceived that on the topic of the waiter she and her host did not +see eye to eye and that little pleasure or profit could be derived from +any discussion centring about him. She changed the subject. She was not +liking Mr. Carmyle quite so much as she had done a few minutes ago, but +it was courteous of him to give her dinner, and she tried to like him as +much as she could. + +"By the way," she said, "my name is Nicholas. I always think it's a good +thing to start with names, don't you?" + +"Mine..." + +"Oh, I know yours. Ginger--Mr. Kemp told me." + +Mr. Carmyle, who since the waiter's departure, had been thawing, +stiffened again at the mention of Ginger. + +"Indeed?" he said, coldly. "Apparently you got intimate." + +Sally did not like his tone. He seemed to be criticizing her, and she +resented criticism from a stranger. Her eyes opened wide and she looked +dangerously across the table. + +"Why 'apparently'? I told you that we had got intimate, and I explained +how. You can't stay shut up in an elevator half the night with anybody +without getting to know him. I found Mr. Kemp very pleasant." + +"Really?" + +"And very interesting." + +Mr. Carmyle raised his eyebrows. + +"Would you call him interesting?" + +"I did call him interesting." Sally was beginning to feel the +exhilaration of battle. Men usually made themselves extremely agreeable +to her, and she reacted belligerently under the stiff unfriendliness +which had come over her companion in the last few minutes. + +"He told me all about himself." + +"And you found that interesting?" + +"Why not?" + +"Well..." A frigid half-smile came and went on Bruce Carmyle's dark +face. "My cousin has many excellent qualities, no doubt--he used to +play football well, and I understand that he is a capable amateur +pugilist--but I should not have supposed him entertaining. We find him a +little dull." + +"I thought it was only royalty that called themselves 'we.'" + +"I meant myself--and the rest of the family." + +The mention of the family was too much for Sally. She had to stop +talking in order to allow her mind to clear itself of rude thoughts. + +"Mr. Kemp was telling me about Mr. Scrymgeour," she went on at length. + +Bruce Carmyle stared for a moment at the yard or so of French bread +which the waiter had placed on the table. + +"Indeed?" he said. "He has an engaging lack of reticence." + +The waiter returned bearing soup and dumped it down. + +"V'la!" he observed, with the satisfied air of a man who has +successfully performed a difficult conjuring trick. He smiled at Sally +expectantly, as though confident of applause from this section of his +audience at least. But Sally's face was set and rigid. She had been +snubbed, and the sensation was as pleasant as it was novel. + +"I think Mr. Kemp had hard luck," she said. + +"If you will excuse me, I would prefer not to discuss the matter." + +Mr. Carmyle's attitude was that Sally might be a pretty girl, but she +was a stranger, and the intimate affairs of the Family were not to be +discussed with strangers, however prepossessing. + +"He was quite in the right. Mr. Scrymgeour was beating a dog..." + +"I've heard the details." + +"Oh, I didn't know that. Well, don't you agree with me, then?" + +"I do not. A man who would throw away an excellent position simply +because..." + +"Oh, well, if that's your view, I suppose it is useless to talk about +it." + +"Quite." + +"Still, there's no harm in asking what you propose to do about +Gin--about Mr. Kemp." + +Mr. Carmyle became more glacial. + +"I'm afraid I cannot discuss..." + +Sally's quick impatience, nobly restrained till now, finally got the +better of her. + +"Oh, for goodness' sake," she snapped, "do try to be human, and don't +always be snubbing people. You remind me of one of those portraits of +men in the eighteenth century, with wooden faces, who look out of +heavy gold frames at you with fishy eyes as if you were a regrettable +incident." + +"Rosbif," said the waiter genially, manifesting himself suddenly beside +them as if he had popped up out of a trap. + +Bruce Carmyle attacked his roast beef morosely. Sally who was in the +mood when she knew that she would be ashamed of herself later on, but +was full of battle at the moment, sat in silence. + +"I am sorry," said Mr. Carmyle ponderously, "if my eyes are fishy. The +fact has not been called to my attention before." + +"I suppose you never had any sisters," said Sally. "They would have told +you." + +Mr. Carmyle relapsed into an offended dumbness, which lasted till the +waiter had brought the coffee. + +"I think," said Sally, getting up, "I'll be going now. I don't seem to +want any coffee, and, if I stay on, I may say something rude. I thought +I might be able to put in a good word for Mr. Kemp and save him from +being massacred, but apparently it's no use. Good-bye, Mr. Carmyle, and +thank you for giving me dinner." + +She made her way down the car, followed by Bruce Carmyle's indignant, +yet fascinated, gaze. Strange emotions were stirring in Mr. Carmyle's +bosom. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. GINGER IN DANGEROUS MOOD + + + +Some few days later, owing to the fact that the latter, being +preoccupied, did not see him first, Bruce Carmyle met his cousin +Lancelot in Piccadilly. They had returned by different routes from +Roville, and Ginger would have preferred the separation to continue. He +was hurrying on with a nod, when Carmyle stopped him. + +"Just the man I wanted to see," he observed. + +"Oh, hullo!" said Ginger, without joy. + +"I was thinking of calling at your club." + +"Yes?" + +"Yes. Cigarette?" + +Ginger peered at the proffered case with the vague suspicion of the man +who has allowed himself to be lured on to the platform and is accepting +a card from the conjurer. He felt bewildered. In all the years of their +acquaintance he could not recall another such exhibition of geniality on +his cousin's part. He was surprised, indeed, at Mr. Carmyle's speaking +to him at all, for the affaire Scrymgeour remained an un-healed wound, +and the Family, Ginger knew, were even now in session upon it. + +"Been back in London long?" + +"Day or two." + +"I heard quite by accident that you had returned and that you were +staying at the club. By the way, thank you for introducing me to Miss +Nicholas." + +Ginger started violently. + +"What!" + +"I was in that compartment, you know, at Roville Station. You threw +her right on top of me. We agreed to consider that an introduction. An +attractive girl." + +Bruce Carmyle had not entirely made up his mind regarding Sally, but on +one point he was clear, that she should not, if he could help it, pass +out of his life. Her abrupt departure had left him with that baffled and +dissatisfied feeling which, though it has little in common with love at +first sight, frequently produces the same effects. She had had, he could +not disguise it from himself, the better of their late encounter and he +was conscious of a desire to meet her again and show her that there was +more in him than she apparently supposed. Bruce Carmyle, in a word, +was piqued: and, though he could not quite decide whether he liked or +disliked Sally, he was very sure that a future without her would have an +element of flatness. + +"A very attractive girl. We had a very pleasant talk." + +"I bet you did," said Ginger enviously. + +"By the way, she did not give you her address by any chance?" + +"Why?" said Ginger suspiciously. His attitude towards Sally's address +resembled somewhat that of a connoisseur who has acquired a unique work +of art. He wanted to keep it to himself and gloat over it. + +"Well, I--er--I promised to send her some books she was anxious to +read..." + +"I shouldn't think she gets much time for reading." + +"Books which are not published in America." + +"Oh, pretty nearly everything is published in America, what? Bound to +be, I mean." + +"Well, these particular books are not," said Mr. Carmyle shortly. He was +finding Ginger's reserve a little trying, and wished that he had been +more inventive. + +"Give them to me and I'll send them to her," suggested Ginger. + +"Good Lord, man!" snapped Mr. Carmyle. "I'm capable of sending a few +books to America. Where does she live?" + +Ginger revealed the sacred number of the holy street which had the luck +to be Sally's headquarters. He did it because with a persistent devil +like his cousin there seemed no way of getting out of it: but he did it +grudgingly. + +"Thanks." Bruce Carmyle wrote the information down with a gold pencil +in a dapper little morocco-bound note-book. He was the sort of man who +always has a pencil, and the backs of old envelopes never enter into his +life. + +There was a pause. Bruce Carmyle coughed. + +"I saw Uncle Donald this morning," he said. + +His manner had lost its geniality. There was no need for it now, and he +was a man who objected to waste. He spoke coldly, and in his voice there +was a familiar sub-tingle of reproof. + +"Yes?" said Ginger moodily. This was the uncle in whose office he +had made his debut as a hasher: a worthy man, highly respected in the +National Liberal Club, but never a favourite of Ginger's. There were +other minor uncles and a few subsidiary aunts who went to make up the +Family, but Uncle Donald was unquestionably the managing director of +that body and it was Ginger's considered opinion that in this capacity +he approximated to a human blister. + +"He wants you to dine with him to-night at Bleke's." + +Ginger's depression deepened. A dinner with Uncle Donald would hardly +have been a cheerful function, even in the surroundings of a banquet +in the Arabian Nights. There was that about Uncle Donald's personality +which would have cast a sobering influence over the orgies of the +Emperor Tiberius at Capri. To dine with him at a morgue like that +relic of Old London, Bleke's Coffee House, which confined its custom +principally to regular patrons who had not missed an evening there for +half a century, was to touch something very near bed-rock. Ginger was +extremely doubtful whether flesh and blood were equal to it. + +"To-night?" he said. "Oh, you mean to-night? Well..." + +"Don't be a fool. You know as well as I do that you've got to go." +Uncle Donald's invitations were royal commands in the Family. "If you've +another engagement you must put it off." + +"Oh, all right." + +"Seven-thirty sharp." + +"All right," said Ginger gloomily. + +The two men went their ways, Bruce Carmyle eastwards because he had +clients to see in his chambers at the Temple; Ginger westwards because +Mr. Carmyle had gone east. There was little sympathy between these +cousins: yet, oddly enough, their thoughts as they walked centred on the +same object. Bruce Carmyle, threading his way briskly through the crowds +of Piccadilly Circus, was thinking of Sally: and so was Ginger as he +loafed aimlessly towards Hyde Park Corner, bumping in a sort of coma +from pedestrian to pedestrian. + +Since his return to London Ginger had been in bad shape. He mooned +through the days and slept poorly at night. If there is one thing +rottener than another in a pretty blighted world, one thing which gives +a fellow the pip and reduces him to the condition of an absolute onion, +it is hopeless love. Hopeless love had got Ginger all stirred up. His +had been hitherto a placid soul. Even the financial crash which had so +altered his life had not bruised him very deeply. His temperament had +enabled him to bear the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune with +a philosophic "Right ho!" But now everything seemed different. Things +irritated him acutely, which before he had accepted as inevitable--his +Uncle Donald's moustache, for instance, and its owner's habit of +employing it during meals as a sort of zareba or earthwork against the +assaults of soup. + +"By gad!" thought Ginger, stopping suddenly opposite Devonshire House. +"If he uses that damned shrubbery as soup-strainer to-night, I'll slosh +him with a fork!" + +Hard thoughts... hard thoughts! And getting harder all the time, for +nothing grows more quickly than a mood of rebellion. Rebellion is a +forest fire that flames across the soul. The spark had been lighted in +Ginger, and long before he reached Hyde Park Corner he was ablaze and +crackling. By the time he returned to his club he was practically a +menace to society--to that section of it, at any rate, which embraced +his Uncle Donald, his minor uncles George and William, and his aunts +Mary, Geraldine, and Louise. + +Nor had the mood passed when he began to dress for the dismal +festivities of Bleke's Coffee House. He scowled as he struggled morosely +with an obstinate tie. One cannot disguise the fact--Ginger was warming +up. And it was just at this moment that Fate, as though it had been +waiting for the psychological instant, applied the finishing touch. +There was a knock at the door, and a waiter came in with a telegram. + +Ginger looked at the envelope. It had been readdressed and forwarded +on from the Hotel Normandie. It was a wireless, handed in on board the +White Star liner Olympic, and it ran as follows: + +Remember. Death to the Family. S. + +Ginger sat down heavily on the bed. + +The driver of the taxi-cab which at twenty-five minutes past seven drew +up at the dingy door of Bleke's Coffee House in the Strand was rather +struck by his fare's manner and appearance. A determined-looking sort of +young bloke, was the taxi-driver's verdict. + + + + +CHAPTER V. SALLY HEARS NEWS + + + +It had been Sally's intention, on arriving in New York, to take a room +at the St. Regis and revel in the gilded luxury to which her wealth +entitled her before moving into the small but comfortable apartment +which, as soon as she had the time, she intended to find and make her +permanent abode. But when the moment came and she was giving directions +to the taxi-driver at the dock, there seemed to her something +revoltingly Fillmorian about the scheme. It would be time enough to +sever herself from the boarding-house which had been her home for three +years when she had found the apartment. Meanwhile, the decent thing to +do, if she did not want to brand herself in the sight of her conscience +as a female Fillmore, was to go back temporarily to Mrs. Meecher's +admirable establishment and foregather with her old friends. After all, +home is where the heart is, even if there are more prunes there than the +gourmet would consider judicious. + +Perhaps it was the unavoidable complacency induced by the thought +that she was doing the right thing, or possibly it was the tingling +expectation of meeting Gerald Foster again after all these weeks of +separation, that made the familiar streets seem wonderfully bright as +she drove through them. It was a perfect, crisp New York morning, all +blue sky and amber sunshine, and even the ash-cans had a stimulating +look about them. The street cars were full of happy people rollicking +off to work: policemen directed the traffic with jaunty affability: +and the white-clad street-cleaners went about their poetic tasks with a +quiet but none the less noticeable relish. It was improbable that any of +these people knew that she was back, but somehow they all seemed to be +behaving as though this were a special day. + +The first discordant note in this overture of happiness was struck by +Mrs. Meecher, who informed Sally, after expressing her gratification +at the news that she required her old room, that Gerald Foster had left +town that morning. + +"Gone to Detroit, he has," said Mrs. Meecher. "Miss Doland, too." She +broke off to speak a caustic word to the boarding-house handyman, +who, with Sally's trunk as a weapon, was depreciating the value of the +wall-paper in the hall. "There's that play of his being tried out there, +you know, Monday," resumed Mrs. Meecher, after the handyman had bumped +his way up the staircase. "They been rehearsing ever since you left." + +Sally was disappointed, but it was such a beautiful morning, and New +York was so wonderful after the dull voyage in the liner that she was +not going to allow herself to be depressed without good reason. After +all, she could go on to Detroit tomorrow. It was nice to have something +to which she could look forward. + +"Oh, is Elsa in the company?" she said. + +"Sure. And very good too, I hear." Mrs. Meecher kept abreast of +theatrical gossip. She was an ex-member of the profession herself, +having been in the first production of "Florodora," though, unlike +everybody else, not one of the original Sextette. "Mr. Faucitt was down +to see a rehearsal, and he said Miss Doland was fine. And he's not easy +to please, as you know." + +"How is Mr. Faucitt?" + +Mrs. Meecher, not unwillingly, for she was a woman who enjoyed the +tragedies of life, made her second essay in the direction of lowering +Sally's uplifted mood. + +"Poor old gentleman, he ain't over and above well. Went to bed early +last night with a headache, and this morning I been to see him and he +don't look well. There's a lot of this Spanish influenza about. It might +be that. Lots o' people have been dying of it, if you believe what you +see in the papers," said Mrs. Meecher buoyantly. + +"Good gracious! You don't think...?" + +"Well, he ain't turned black," admitted Mrs. Meecher with regret. "They +say they turn black. If you believe what you see in the papers, that is. +Of course, that may come later," she added with the air of one confident +that all will come right in the future. "The doctor'll be in to see him +pretty soon. He's quite happy. Toto's sitting with him." + +Sally's concern increased. Like everyone who had ever spent any length +of time in the house, she had strong views on Toto. This quadruped, who +stained the fame of the entire canine race by posing as a dog, was a +small woolly animal with a persistent and penetrating yap, hard to bear +with equanimity in health and certainly quite outside the range of a +sick man. Her heart bled for Mr. Faucitt. Mrs. Meecher, on the other +hand, who held a faith in her little pet's amiability and power to +soothe which seven years' close association had been unable to shake, +seemed to feel that, with Toto on the spot, all that could be done had +been done as far as pampering the invalid was concerned. + +"I must go up and see him," cried Sally. "Poor old dear." + +"Sure. You know his room. You can hear Toto talking to him now," said +Mrs. Meecher complacently. "He wants a cracker, that's what he wants. +Toto likes a cracker after breakfast." + +The invalid's eyes, as Sally entered the room, turned wearily to the +door. At the sight of Sally they lit up with an incredulous rapture. +Almost any intervention would have pleased Mr. Faucitt at that moment, +for his little playmate had long outstayed any welcome that might +originally have been his: but that the caller should be his beloved +Sally seemed to the old man something in the nature of a return of the +age of miracles. + +"Sally!" + +"One moment. Here, Toto!" + +Toto, struck momentarily dumb by the sight of food, had jumped off the +bed and was standing with his head on one side, peering questioningly at +the cracker. He was a suspicious dog, but he allowed himself to be lured +into the passage, upon which Sally threw the cracker down and slipped +in and shut the door. Toto, after a couple of yaps, which may have been +gratitude or baffled fury, trotted off downstairs, and Mr. Faucitt drew +a deep breath. + +"Sally, you come, as ever, as an angel of mercy. Our worthy Mrs. Meecher +means well, and I yield to no man in my respect for her innate kindness +of heart: but she errs in supposing that that thrice-damned whelp of +hers is a combination of sick-nurse, soothing medicine, and a week at +the seaside. She insisted on bringing him here. He was yapping then, as +he was yapping when, with womanly resource which I cannot sufficiently +praise, you decoyed him hence. And each yap went through me like +hammer-strokes on sheeted tin. Sally, you stand alone among womankind. +You shine like a good deed in a naughty world. When did you get back?" + +"I've only just arrived in my hired barouche from the pier." + +"And you came to see your old friend without delay? I am grateful and +flattered. Sally, my dear." + +"Of course I came to see you. Do you suppose that, when Mrs. Meecher +told me you were sick, I just said 'Is that so?' and went on talking +about the weather? Well, what do you mean by it? Frightening everybody. +Poor old darling, do you feel very bad?" + +"One thousand individual mice are nibbling the base of my spine, and +I am conscious of a constant need of cooling refreshment. But what of +that? Your presence is a tonic. Tell me, how did our Sally enjoy foreign +travel?" + +"Our Sally had the time of her life." + +"Did you visit England?" + +"Only passing through." + +"How did it look?" asked Mr. Faucitt eagerly. + +"Moist. Very moist." + +"It would," said Mr. Faucitt indulgently. "I confess that, happy as I +have been in this country, there are times when I miss those wonderful +London days, when a sort of cosy brown mist hangs over the streets and +the pavements ooze with a perspiration of mud and water, and you see +through the haze the yellow glow of the Bodega lamps shining in the +distance like harbour-lights. Not," said Mr. Faucitt, "that I specify +the Bodega to the exclusion of other and equally worthy hostelries. I +have passed just as pleasant hours in Rule's and Short's. You missed +something by not lingering in England, Sally." + +"I know I did--pneumonia." + +Mr. Faucitt shook his head reproachfully. + +"You are prejudiced, my dear. You would have enjoyed London if you had +had the courage to brave its superficial gloom. Where did you spend your +holiday? Paris?" + +"Part of the time. And the rest of the while I was down by the sea. It +was glorious. I don't think I would ever have come back if I hadn't had +to. But, of course, I wanted to see you all again. And I wanted to be at +the opening of Mr. Foster's play. Mrs. Meecher tells me you went to one +of the rehearsals." + +"I attended a dog-fight which I was informed was a rehearsal," said Mr. +Faucitt severely. "There is no rehearsing nowadays." + +"Oh dear! Was it as bad as all that?" + +"The play is good. The play--I will go further--is excellent. It has +fat. But the acting..." + +"Mrs. Meecher said you told her that Elsa was good." + +"Our worthy hostess did not misreport me. Miss Doland has great +possibilities. She reminds me somewhat of Matilda Devine, under whose +banner I played a season at the Old Royalty in London many years ago. +She has the seeds of greatness in her, but she is wasted in the present +case on an insignificant part. There is only one part in the play. I +allude to the one murdered by Miss Mabel Hobson." + +"Murdered!" Sally's heart sank. She had been afraid of this, and it +was no satisfaction to feel that she had warned Gerald. "Is she very +terrible?" + +"She has the face of an angel and the histrionic ability of that curious +suet pudding which our estimable Mrs. Meecher is apt to give us on +Fridays. In my professional career I have seen many cases of what I may +term the Lady Friend in the role of star, but Miss Hobson eclipses them +all. I remember in the year '94 a certain scion of the plutocracy +took it into his head to present a female for whom he had conceived an +admiration in a part which would have taxed the resources of the ablest. +I was engaged in her support, and at the first rehearsal I recollect +saying to my dear old friend, Arthur Moseby--dead, alas, these many +years. An excellent juvenile, but, like so many good fellows, cursed +with a tendency to lift the elbow--I recollect saying to him 'Arthur, +dear boy, I give it two weeks.' 'Max,' was his reply, 'you are an +incurable optimist. One consecutive night, laddie, one consecutive +night.' We had, I recall, an even half-crown upon it. He won. We opened +at Wigan, our leading lady got the bird, and the show closed next day. +I was forcibly reminded of this incident as I watched Miss Hobson +rehearsing." + +"Oh, poor Ger--poor Mr. Foster!" + +"I do not share your commiseration for that young man," said Mr. Faucitt +austerely. "You probably are almost a stranger to him, but he and I have +been thrown together a good deal of late. A young man upon whom, mark my +words, success, if it ever comes, will have the worst effects. I dislike +him. Sally. He is, I think, without exception, the most selfish and +self-centred young man of my acquaintance. He reminds me very much +of old Billy Fothergill, with whom I toured a good deal in the later +eighties. Did I ever tell you the story of Billy and the amateur +who...?" + +Sally was in no mood to listen to the adventures of Mr. Fothergill. +The old man's innocent criticism of Gerald had stabbed her deeply. A +momentary impulse to speak hotly in his defence died away as she saw +Mr. Faucitt's pale, worn old face. He had meant no harm, after all. How +could he know what Gerald was to her? + +She changed the conversation abruptly. + +"Have you seen anything of Fillmore while I've been away?" + +"Fillmore? Why yes, my dear, curiously enough I happened to run into him +on Broadway only a few days ago. He seemed changed--less stiff and aloof +than he had been for some time past. I may be wronging him, but there +have been times of late when one might almost have fancied him a trifle +up-stage. All that was gone at our last encounter. He appeared glad to +see me and was most cordial." + +Sally found her composure restored. Her lecture on the night of the +party had evidently, she thought, not been wasted. Mr. Faucitt, however, +advanced another theory to account for the change in the Man of Destiny. + +"I rather fancy," he said, "that the softening influence has been the +young man's fiancée." + +"What? Fillmore's not engaged?" + +"Did he not write and tell you? I suppose he was waiting to inform you +when you returned. Yes, Fillmore is betrothed. The lady was with +him when we met. A Miss Winch. In the profession, I understand. He +introduced me. A very charming and sensible young lady, I thought." + +Sally shook her head. + +"She can't be. Fillmore would never have got engaged to anyone like +that. Was her hair crimson?" + +"Brown, if I recollect rightly." + +"Very loud, I suppose, and overdressed?" + +"On the contrary, neat and quiet." + +"You've made a mistake," said Sally decidedly. "She can't have been like +that. I shall have to look into this. It does seem hard that I can't go +away for a few weeks without all my friends taking to beds of sickness +and all my brothers getting ensnared by vampires." + +A knock at the door interrupted her complaint. Mrs. Meecher entered, +ushering in a pleasant little man with spectacles and black bag. + +"The doctor to see you, Mr. Faucitt." Mrs. Meecher cast an appraising +eye at the invalid, as if to detect symptoms of approaching +discoloration. "I've been telling him that what I think you've gotten is +this here new Spanish influenza. Two more deaths there were in the paper +this morning, if you can believe what you see..." + +"I wonder," said the doctor, "if you would mind going and bringing me a +small glass of water?" + +"Why, sure." + +"Not a large glass--a small glass. Just let the tap run for a few +moments and take care not to spill any as you come up the stairs. I +always ask ladies, like our friend who has just gone," he added as the +door closed, "to bring me a glass of water. It keeps them amused and +interested and gets them out of the way, and they think I am going to do +a conjuring trick with it. As a matter of fact, I'm going to drink it. +Now let's have a look at you." + +The examination did not take long. At the end of it the doctor seemed +somewhat chagrined. + +"Our good friend's diagnosis was correct. I'd give a leg to say it +wasn't, but it was. It is this here new Spanish influenza. Not a bad +attack. You want to stay in bed and keep warm, and I'll write you out a +prescription. You ought to be nursed. Is this young lady a nurse?" + +"No, no, merely..." + +"Of course I'm a nurse," said Sally decidedly. "It isn't difficult, +is it, doctor? I know nurses smooth pillows. I can do that. Is there +anything else?" + +"Their principal duty is to sit here and prevent the excellent and +garrulous lady who has just left us from getting in. They must also be +able to aim straight with a book or an old shoe, if that small woolly +dog I met downstairs tries to force an entrance. If you are equal to +these tasks, I can leave the case in your hands with every confidence." + +"But, Sally, my dear," said Mr. Faucitt, concerned, "you must not waste +your time looking after me. You have a thousand things to occupy you." + +"There's nothing I want to do more than help you to get better. I'll +just go out and send a wire, and then I'll be right back." + +Five minutes later, Sally was in a Western Union office, telegraphing +to Gerald that she would be unable to reach Detroit in time for the +opening. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. FIRST AID FOR FILLMORE + + + +1 + + + +It was not till the following Friday that Sally was able to start for +Detroit. She arrived on the Saturday morning and drove to the Hotel +Statler. Having ascertained that Gerald was stopping in the hotel and +having 'phoned up to his room to tell him to join her, she went into the +dining-room and ordered breakfast. + +She felt low-spirited as she waited for the food to arrive. The nursing +of Mr. Faucitt had left her tired, and she had not slept well on the +train. But the real cause of her depression was the fact that there had +been a lack of enthusiasm in Gerald's greeting over the telephone just +now. He had spoken listlessly, as though the fact of her returning +after all these weeks was a matter of no account, and she felt hurt and +perplexed. + +A cup of coffee had a stimulating effect. Men, of course, were always +like this in the early morning. It would, no doubt, be a very different +Gerald who would presently bound into the dining-room, quickened and +restored by a cold shower-bath. In the meantime, here was food, and she +needed it. + +She was pouring out her second cup of coffee when a stout young man, +of whom she had caught a glimpse as he moved about that section of the +hotel lobby which was visible through the open door of the dining-room, +came in and stood peering about as though in search of someone. The +momentary sight she had had of this young man had interested Sally. She +had thought how extraordinarily like he was to her brother Fillmore. Now +she perceived that it was Fillmore himself. + +Sally was puzzled. What could Fillmore be doing so far west? She had +supposed him to be a permanent resident of New York. But, of course, +your man of affairs and vast interests flits about all over the place. +At any rate, here he was, and she called him. And, after he had stood in +the doorway looking in every direction except the right one for another +minute, he saw her and came over to her table. + +"Why, Sally?" His manner, she thought, was nervous--one might almost +have said embarrassed. She attributed this to a guilty conscience. +Presently he would have to break to her the news that he had become +engaged to be married without her sisterly sanction, and no doubt he was +wondering how to begin. "What are you doing here? I thought you were in +Europe." + +"I got back a week ago, but I've been nursing poor old Mr. Faucitt ever +since then. He's been ill, poor old dear. I've come here to see Mr. +Foster's play, 'The Primrose Way,' you know. Is it a success?" + +"It hasn't opened yet." + +"Don't be silly, Fill. Do pull yourself together. It opened last +Monday." + +"No, it didn't. Haven't you heard? They've closed all the theatres +because of this infernal Spanish influenza. Nothing has been playing +this week. You must have seen it in the papers." + +"I haven't had time to read the papers. Oh, Fill, what an awful shame!" + +"Yes, it's pretty tough. Makes the company all on edge. I've had the +darndest time, I can tell you." + +"Why, what have you got to do with it?" + +Fillmore coughed. + +"I--er--oh, I didn't tell you that. I'm sort of--er--mixed up in the +show. Cracknell--you remember he was at college with me--suggested that +I should come down and look at it. Shouldn't wonder if he wants me to +put money into it and so on." + +"I thought he had all the money in the world." + +"Yes, he has a lot, but these fellows like to let a pal in on a good +thing." + +"Is it a good thing?" + +"The play's fine." + +"That's what Mr. Faucitt said. But Mabel Hobson..." + +Fillmore's ample face registered emotion. + +"She's an awful woman, Sally! She can't act, and she throws her +weight about all the time. The other day there was a fuss about a +paper-knife..." + +"How do you mean, a fuss about a paper-knife?" + +"One of the props, you know. It got mislaid. I'm certain it wasn't my +fault..." + +"How could it have been your fault?" asked Sally wonderingly. Love +seemed to have the worst effects on Fillmore's mentality. + +"Well--er--you know how it is. Angry woman... blames the first person +she sees... This paper-knife..." + +Fillmore's voice trailed off into pained silence. + +"Mr. Faucitt said Elsa Doland was good." + +"Oh, she's all right," said Fillmore indifferently. "But--" His face +brightened and animation crept into his voice. "But the girl you want to +watch is Miss Winch. Gladys Winch. She plays the maid. She's only in +the first act, and hasn't much to say, except 'Did you ring, madam?' and +things like that. But it's the way she says 'em! Sally, that girl's a +genius! The greatest character actress in a dozen years! You mark my +words, in a darned little while you'll see her name up on Broadway in +electric light. Personality? Ask me! Charm? She wrote the words and +music! Looks?..." + +"All right! All right! I know all about it, Fill. And will you kindly +inform me how you dared to get engaged without consulting me?" + +Fillmore blushed richly. + +"Oh, do you know?" + +"Yes. Mr. Faucitt told me." + +"Well..." + +"Well?" + +"Well, I'm only human," argued Fillmore. + +"I call that a very handsome admission. You've got quite modest, Fill." + +He had certainly changed for the better since their last meeting. + +It was as if someone had punctured him and let out all the pomposity. +If this was due, as Mr. Faucitt had suggested, to the influence of Miss +Winch, Sally felt that she could not but approve of the romance. + +"I'll introduce you sometime,' said Fillmore. + +"I want to meet her very much." + +"I'll have to be going now. I've got to see Bunbury. I thought he might +be in here." + +"Who's Bunbury?" + +"The producer. I suppose he is breakfasting in his room. I'd better go +up." + +"You are busy, aren't you. Little marvel! It's lucky they've got you to +look after them." + +Fillmore retired and Sally settled down to wait for Gerald, no longer +hurt by his manner over the telephone. Poor Gerald! No wonder he had +seemed upset. + +A few minutes later he came in. + +"Oh, Jerry darling," said Sally, as he reached the table, "I'm so sorry. +I've just been hearing about it." + +Gerald sat down. His appearance fulfilled the promise of his voice +over the telephone. A sort of nervous dullness wrapped him about like a +garment. + +"It's just my luck," he said gloomily. "It's the kind of thing that +couldn't happen to anyone but me. Damned fools! Where's the sense in +shutting the theatres, even if there is influenza about? They let people +jam against one another all day in the stores. If that doesn't hurt them +why should it hurt them to go to theatres? Besides, it's all infernal +nonsense about this thing. I don't believe there is such a thing as +Spanish influenza. People get colds in their heads and think they're +dying. It's all a fake scare." + +"I don't think it's that," said Sally. "Poor Mr. Faucitt had it quite +badly. That's why I couldn't come earlier." + +Gerald did not seem interested either by the news of Mr. Faucitt's +illness or by the fact that Sally, after delay, had at last arrived. He +dug a spoon sombrely into his grape-fruit. + +"We've been hanging about here day after day, getting bored to death +all the time... The company's going all to pieces. They're sick of +rehearsing and rehearsing when nobody knows if we'll ever open. They +were all keyed up a week ago, and they've been sagging ever since. It +will ruin the play, of course. My first chance! Just chucked away." + +Sally was listening with a growing feeling of desolation. She tried to +be fair, to remember that he had had a terrible disappointment and was +under a great strain. And yet... it was unfortunate that self-pity was a +thing she particularly disliked in a man. Her vanity, too, was hurt. It +was obvious that her arrival, so far from acting as a magic restorative, +had effected nothing. She could not help remembering, though it made +her feel disloyal, what Mr. Faucitt had said about Gerald. She had never +noticed before that he was remarkably self-centred, but he was thrusting +the fact upon her attention now. + +"That Hobson woman is beginning to make trouble," went on Gerald, +prodding in a despairing sort of way at scrambled eggs. "She ought never +to have had the part, never. She can't handle it. Elsa Doland could play +it a thousand times better. I wrote Elsa in a few lines the other day, +and the Hobson woman went right up in the air. You don't know what a +star is till you've seen one of these promoted clothes-props from the +Follies trying to be one. It took me an hour to talk her round and keep +her from throwing up her part." + +"Why not let her throw up her part?" + +"For heaven's sake talk sense," said Gerald querulously. "Do you suppose +that man Cracknell would keep the play on if she wasn't in it? He would +close the show in a second, and where would I be then? You don't seem +to realize that this is a big chance for me. I'd look a fool throwing it +away." + +"I see," said Sally, shortly. She had never felt so wretched in her +life. Foreign travel, she decided, was a mistake. It might be pleasant +and broadening to the mind, but it seemed to put you so out of touch +with people when you got back. She analysed her sensations, and arrived +at the conclusion that what she was resenting was the fact that Gerald +was trying to get the advantages of two attitudes simultaneously. A man +in trouble may either be the captain of his soul and superior to pity, +or he may be a broken thing for a woman to pet and comfort. Gerald, +it seemed to her, was advertising himself as an object for her +commiseration, and at the same time raising a barrier against it. He +appeared to demand her sympathy while holding himself aloof from it. She +had the uncomfortable sensation of feeling herself shut out and useless. + +"By the way," said Gerald, "there's one thing. I have to keep her +jollying along all the time, so for goodness' sake don't go letting it +out that we're engaged." + +Sally's chin went up with a jerk. This was too much. + +"If you find it a handicap being engaged to me..." + +"Don't be silly." Gerald took refuge in pathos. "Good God! It's tough! +Here am I, worried to death, and you..." + +Before he could finish the sentence, Sally's mood had undergone one +of those swift changes which sometimes made her feel that she must be +lacking in character. A simple, comforting thought had come to her, +altering her entire outlook. She had come off the train tired and +gritty, and what seemed the general out-of-jointness of the world was +entirely due, she decided, to the fact that she had not had a bath and +that her hair was all anyhow. She felt suddenly tranquil. If it was +merely her grubby and dishevelled condition that made Gerald seem to her +so different, all was well. She put her hand on his with a quick gesture +of penitence. + +"I'm so sorry," she said. "I've been a brute, but I do sympathize, +really." + +"I've had an awful time," mumbled Gerald. + +"I know, I know. But you never told me you were glad to see me." + +"Of course I'm glad to see you." + +"Why didn't you say so, then, you poor fish? And why didn't you ask me +if I had enjoyed myself in Europe?" + +"Did you enjoy yourself?" + +"Yes, except that I missed you so much. There! Now we can consider my +lecture on foreign travel finished, and you can go on telling me your +troubles." + +Gerald accepted the invitation. He spoke at considerable length, though +with little variety. It appeared definitely established in his mind that +Providence had invented Spanish influenza purely with a view to wrecking +his future. But now he seemed less aloof, more open to sympathy. +The brief thunderstorm had cleared the air. Sally lost that sense of +detachment and exclusion which had weighed upon her. + +"Well," said Gerald, at length, looking at his watch, "I suppose I had +better be off." + +"Rehearsal?" + +"Yes, confound it. It's the only way of getting through the day. Are you +coming along?" + +"I'll come directly I've unpacked and tidied myself up." + +"See you at the theatre, then." + +Sally went out and rang for the lift to take her up to her room. + + + +2 + + + +The rehearsal had started when she reached the theatre. As she entered +the dark auditorium, voices came to her with that thin and reedy effect +which is produced by people talking in an empty building. She sat down +at the back of the house, and, as her eyes grew accustomed to the gloom, +was able to see Gerald sitting in the front row beside a man with a bald +head fringed with orange hair whom she took correctly to be Mr. Bunbury, +the producer. Dotted about the house in ones and twos were members of +the company whose presence was not required in the first act. On the +stage, Elsa Doland, looking very attractive, was playing a scene with a +man in a bowler hat. She was speaking a line, as Sally came in. + +"Why, what do you mean, father?" + +"Tiddly-omty-om," was the bowler-hatted one's surprising reply. +"Tiddly-omty-om... long speech ending in 'find me in the library.' And +exit," said the man in the bowler hat, starting to do so. + +For the first time Sally became aware of the atmosphere of nerves. +Mr. Bunbury, who seemed to be a man of temperament, picked up his +walking-stick, which was leaning against the next seat, and flung it +with some violence across the house. + +"For God's sake!" said Mr. Bunbury. + +"Now what?" inquired the bowler hat, interested, pausing hallway across +the stage. + +"Do speak the lines, Teddy," exclaimed Gerald. "Don't skip them in that +sloppy fashion." + +"You don't want me to go over the whole thing?" asked the bowler hat, +amazed. + +"Yes!" + +"Not the whole damn thing?" queried the bowler hat, fighting with +incredulity. + +"This is a rehearsal," snapped Mr. Bunbury. "If we are not going to do +it properly, what's the use of doing it at all?" + +This seemed to strike the erring Teddy, if not as reasonable, at any +rate as one way of looking at it. He delivered the speech in an injured +tone and shuffled off. The atmosphere of tenseness was unmistakable now. +Sally could feel it. The world of the theatre is simply a large nursery +and its inhabitants children who readily become fretful if anything goes +wrong. The waiting and the uncertainty, the loafing about in strange +hotels in a strange city, the dreary rehearsing of lines which had been +polished to the last syllable more than a week ago--these things had +sapped the nerve of the Primrose Way company and demoralization had set +in. It would require only a trifle to produce an explosion. + +Elsa Doland now moved to the door, pressed a bell, and, taking a +magazine from the table, sat down in a chair near the footlights. +A moment later, in answer to the ring, a young woman entered, to be +greeted instantly by an impassioned bellow from Mr. Bunbury. + +"Miss Winch!" + +The new arrival stopped and looked out over the footlights, not in the +pained manner of the man in the bowler hat, but with the sort of +genial indulgence of one who has come to a juvenile party to amuse the +children. She was a square, wholesome, good-humoured looking girl with +a serious face, the gravity of which was contradicted by the faint smile +that seemed to lurk about the corner of her mouth. She was certainly not +pretty, and Sally, watching her with keen interest, was surprised that +Fillmore had had the sense to disregard surface homeliness and recognize +her charm. Deep down in Fillmore, Sally decided, there must lurk an +unsuspected vein of intelligence. + +"Hello?" said Miss Winch, amiably. + +Mr. Bunbury seemed profoundly moved. + +"Miss Winch, did I or did I not ask you to refrain from chewing gum +during rehearsal?" + +"That's right, so you did," admitted Miss Winch, chummily. + +"Then why are you doing it?" + +Fillmore's fiancée revolved the criticized refreshment about her tongue +for a moment before replying. + +"Bit o' business," she announced, at length. + +"What do you mean, a bit of business?" + +"Character stuff," explained Miss Winch in her pleasant, drawling voice. +"Thought it out myself. Maids chew gum, you know." + +Mr. Bunbury ruffled his orange hair in an over-wrought manner with the +palm of his right hand. + +"Have you ever seen a maid?" he asked, despairingly. + +"Yes, sir. And they chew gum." + +"I mean a parlour-maid in a smart house," moaned Mr. Bunbury. "Do you +imagine for a moment that in a house such as this is supposed to be the +parlour-maid would be allowed to come into the drawing-room champing +that disgusting, beastly stuff?" + +Miss Winch considered the point. + +"Maybe you're right." She brightened. "Listen! Great idea! Mr. Foster +can write in a line for Elsa, calling me down, and another giving me +a good come-back, and then another for Elsa saying something else, and +then something really funny for me, and so on. We can work it up into a +big comic scene. Five or six minutes, all laughs." + +This ingenious suggestion had the effect of depriving the producer +momentarily of speech, and while he was struggling for utterance, there +dashed out from the wings a gorgeous being in blue velvet and a hat of +such unimpeachable smartness that Sally ached at the sight of it with a +spasm of pure envy. + +"Say!" + +Miss Mabel Hobson had practically every personal advantage which +nature can bestow with the exception of a musical voice. Her figure was +perfect, her face beautiful, and her hair a mass of spun gold; but her +voice in moments of emotion was the voice of a peacock. + +"Say, listen to me for just one moment!" + +Mr. Bunbury recovered from his trance. + +"Miss Hobson! Please!" + +"Yes, that's all very well..." + +"You are interrupting the rehearsal." + +"You bet your sorrowful existence I'm interrupting the rehearsal," +agreed Miss Hobson, with emphasis. "And, if you want to make a little +easy money, you go and bet somebody ten seeds that I'm going to +interrupt it again every time there's any talk of writing up any darned +part in the show except mine. Write up other people's parts? Not while I +have my strength!" + +A young man with butter-coloured hair, who had entered from the wings in +close attendance on the injured lady, attempted to calm the storm. + +"Now, sweetie!" + +"Oh, can it, Reggie!" said Miss Hobson, curtly. + +Mr. Cracknell obediently canned it. He was not one of your brutal +cave-men. He subsided into the recesses of a high collar and began to +chew the knob of his stick. + +"I'm the star," resumed Miss Hobson, vehemently, "and, if you think +anybody else's part's going to be written up... well, pardon me while I +choke with laughter! If so much as a syllable is written into anybody's +part, I walk straight out on my two feet. You won't see me go, I'll be +so quick." + +Mr. Bunbury sprang to his feet and waved his hands. + +"For heaven's sake! Are we rehearsing, or is this a debating society? +Miss Hobson, nothing is going to be written into anybody's part. Now are +you satisfied?" + +"She said..." + +"Oh, never mind," observed Miss Winch, equably. "It was only a random +thought. Working for the good of the show all the time. That's me." + +"Now, sweetie!" pleaded Mr. Cracknell, emerging from the collar like a +tortoise. + +Miss Hobson reluctantly allowed herself to be reassured. + +"Oh, well, that's all right, then. But don't forget I know how to look +after myself," she said, stating a fact which was abundantly obvious to +all who had had the privilege of listening to her. "Any raw work, and +out I walk so quick it'll make you giddy." + +She retired, followed by Mr. Cracknell, and the wings swallowed her up. + +"Shall I say my big speech now?" inquired Miss Winch, over the +footlights. + +"Yes, yes! Get on with the rehearsal. We've wasted half the morning." + +"Did you ring, madam?" said Miss Winch to Elsa, who had been reading her +magazine placidly through the late scene. + +The rehearsal proceeded, and Sally watched it with a sinking heart. It +was all wrong. Novice as she was in things theatrical, she could see +that. There was no doubt that Miss Hobson was superbly beautiful and +would have shed lustre on any part which involved the minimum of words +and the maximum of clothes: but in the pivotal role of a serious play, +her very physical attributes only served to emphasize and point her +hopeless incapacity. Sally remembered Mr. Faucitt's story of the lady +who got the bird at Wigan. She did not see how history could fail to +repeat itself. The theatrical public of America will endure much from +youth and beauty, but there is a limit. + +A shrill, passionate cry from the front row, and Mr. Bunbury was on his +feet again. Sally could not help wondering whether things were going +particularly wrong to-day, or whether this was one of Mr. Bunbury's +ordinary mornings. + +"Miss Hobson!" + +The action of the drama had just brought that emotional lady on left +centre and had taken her across to the desk which stood on the other +side of the stage. The desk was an important feature of the play, for it +symbolized the absorption in business which, exhibited by her husband, +was rapidly breaking Miss Hobson's heart. He loved his desk better than +his young wife, that was what it amounted to, and no wife can stand that +sort of thing. + +"Oh, gee!" said Miss Hobson, ceasing to be the distressed wife and +becoming the offended star. "What's it this time?" + +"I suggested at the last rehearsal and at the rehearsal before and +the rehearsal before that, that, on that line, you, should pick up +the paper-knife and toy negligently with it. You did it yesterday, and +to-day you've forgotten it again." + +"My God!" cried Miss Hobson, wounded to the quick. "If this don't beat +everything! How the heck can I toy negligently with a paper-knife when +there's no paper-knife for me to toy negligently with?" + +"The paper-knife is on the desk." + +"It's not on the desk." + +"No paper-knife?" + +"No paper-knife. And it's no good picking on me. I'm the star, not the +assistant stage manager. If you're going to pick on anybody, pick on +him." + +The advice appeared to strike Mr. Bunbury as good. He threw back his +head and bayed like a bloodhound. + +There was a momentary pause, and then from the wings on the prompt side +there shambled out a stout and shrinking figure, in whose hand was a +script of the play and on whose face, lit up by the footlights, there +shone a look of apprehension. It was Fillmore, the Man of Destiny. + + + +3 + + + +Alas, poor Fillmore! He stood in the middle of the stage with the +lightning of Mr. Bunbury's wrath playing about his defenceless head, and +Sally, recovering from her first astonishment, sent a wave of sisterly +commiseration floating across the theatre to him. She did not often pity +Fillmore. His was a nature which in the sunshine of prosperity had a +tendency to grow a trifle lush; and such of the minor ills of life as +had afflicted him during the past three years, had, she considered, +been wholesome and educative and a matter not for concern but for +congratulation. Unmoved, she had watched him through that lean period +lunching on coffee and buckwheat cakes, and curbing from motives of +economy a somewhat florid taste in dress. But this was different. This +was tragedy. Somehow or other, blasting disaster must have smitten the +Fillmore bank-roll, and he was back where he had started. His presence +here this morning could mean nothing else. + +She recalled his words at the breakfast-table about financing the +play. How like Fillmore to try to save his face for the moment with an +outrageous bluff, though well aware that he would have to reveal the +truth sooner or later. She realized how he must have felt when he had +seen her at the hotel. Yes, she was sorry for Fillmore. + +And, as she listened to the fervent eloquence of Mr. Bunbury, she +perceived that she had every reason to be. Fillmore was having a bad +time. One of the chief articles of faith in the creed of all theatrical +producers is that if anything goes wrong it must be the fault of the +assistant stage manager and Mr. Bunbury was evidently orthodox in his +views. He was showing oratorical gifts of no mean order. The paper-knife +seemed to inspire him. Gradually, Sally began to get the feeling that +this harmless, necessary stage-property was the source from which +sprang most, if not all, of the trouble in the world. It had disappeared +before. Now it had disappeared again. Could Mr. Bunbury go on struggling +in a universe where this sort of thing happened? He seemed to doubt it. +Being a red-blooded, one-hundred-per-cent American man, he would try +hard, but it was a hundred to one shot that he would get through. He +had asked for a paper-knife. There was no paper-knife. Why was there no +paper-knife? Where was the paper-knife anyway? + +"I assure you, Mr. Bunbury," bleated the unhappy Fillmore, obsequiously. +"I placed it with the rest of the properties after the last rehearsal." + +"You couldn't have done." + +"I assure you I did." + +"And it walked away, I suppose," said Miss Hobson with cold scorn, +pausing in the operation of brightening up her lower lip with a +lip-stick. + +A calm, clear voice spoke. + +"It was taken away," said the calm, clear voice. + +Miss Winch had added herself to the symposium. She stood beside +Fillmore, chewing placidly. It took more than raised voices and +gesticulating hands to disturb Miss Winch. + +"Miss Hobson took it," she went on in her cosy, drawling voice. "I saw +her." + +Sensation in court. The prisoner, who seemed to feel his position +deeply, cast a pop-eyed glance full of gratitude at his advocate. +Mr. Bunbury, in his capacity of prosecuting attorney, ran his fingers +through his hair in some embarrassment, for he was regretting now that +he had made such a fuss. Miss Hobson thus assailed by an underling, +spun round and dropped the lip-stick, which was neatly retrieved by the +assiduous Mr. Cracknell. Mr. Cracknell had his limitations, but he was +rather good at picking up lip-sticks. + +"What's that? I took it? I never did anything of the sort." + +"Miss Hobson took it after the rehearsal yesterday," drawled Gladys +Winch, addressing the world in general, "and threw it negligently at the +theatre cat." + +Miss Hobson seemed taken aback. Her composure was not restored by Mr. +Bunbury's next remark. The producer, like his company, had been feeling +the strain of the past few days, and, though as a rule he avoided +anything in the nature of a clash with the temperamental star, this +matter of the missing paper-knife had bitten so deeply into his soul +that he felt compelled to speak his mind. + +"In future, Miss Hobson, I should be glad if, when you wish to throw +anything at the cat, you would not select a missile from the property +box. Good heavens!" he cried, stung by the way fate was maltreating +him, "I have never experienced anything like this before. I have +been producing plays all my life, and this is the first time this has +happened. I have produced Nazimova. Nazimova never threw paper-knives at +cats." + +"Well, I hate cats," said Miss Hobson, as though that settled it. + +"I," murmured Miss Winch, "love little pussy, her fur is so warm, and if +I don't hurt her she'll do me no..." + +"Oh, my heavens!" shouted Gerald Foster, bounding from his seat and for +the first time taking a share in the debate. "Are we going to spend the +whole day arguing about cats and paper-knives? For goodness' sake, clear +the stage and stop wasting time." + +Miss Hobson chose to regard this intervention as an affront. + +"Don't shout at me, Mr. Foster!" + +"I wasn't shouting at you." + +"If you have anything to say to me, lower your voice." + +"He can't," observed Miss Winch. "He's a tenor." + +"Nazimova never..." began Mr. Bunbury. + +Miss Hobson was not to be diverted from her theme by reminiscences of +Nazimova. She had not finished dealing with Gerald. + +"In the shows I've been in," she said, mordantly, "the author wasn't +allowed to go about the place getting fresh with the leading lady. In +the shows I've been in the author sat at the back and spoke when he was +spoken to. In the shows I've been in..." + +Sally was tingling all over. This reminded her of the dog-fight on the +Roville sands. She wanted to be in it, and only the recognition that it +was a private fight and that she would be intruding kept her silent. The +lure of the fray, however, was too strong for her wholly to resist it. +Almost unconsciously, she had risen from her place and drifted down the +aisle so as to be nearer the white-hot centre of things. She was now +standing in the lighted space by the orchestra-pit, and her presence +attracted the roving attention of Miss Hobson, who, having concluded her +remarks on authors and their legitimate sphere of activity, was looking +about for some other object of attack. + +"Who the devil," inquired Miss Hobson, "is that?" + +Sally found herself an object of universal scrutiny and wished that she +had remained in the obscurity of the back rows. + +"I am Mr. Nicholas' sister," was the best method of identification that +she could find. + +"Who's Mr. Nicholas?" + +Fillmore timidly admitted that he was Mr. Nicholas. He did it in the +manner of one in the dock pleading guilty to a major charge, and +at least half of those present seemed surprised. To them, till now, +Fillmore had been a nameless thing, answering to the shout of "Hi!" + +Miss Hobson received the information with a laugh of such exceeding +bitterness that strong men blanched and Mr. Cracknell started so +convulsively that he nearly jerked his collar off its stud. + +"Now, sweetie!" urged Mr. Cracknell. + +Miss Hobson said that Mr. Cracknell gave her a pain in the gizzard. She +recommended his fading away, and he did so--into his collar. He seemed +to feel that once well inside his collar he was "home" and safe from +attack. + +"I'm through!" announced Miss Hobson. It appeared that Sally's presence +had in some mysterious fashion fulfilled the function of the last straw. +"This is the by-Goddest show I was ever in! I can stand for a whole lot, +but when it comes to the assistant stage manager being allowed to fill +the theatre with his sisters and his cousins and his aunts it's time to +quit." + +"But, sweetie!" pleaded Mr. Cracknell, coming to the surface. + +"Oh, go and choke yourself!" said Miss Hobson, crisply. And, swinging +round like a blue panther, she strode off. A door banged, and the sound +of it seemed to restore Mr. Cracknell's power of movement. He, too, shot +up stage and disappeared. + +"Hello, Sally," said Elsa Doland, looking up from her magazine. The +battle, raging all round her, had failed to disturb her detachment. +"When did you get back?" + +Sally trotted up the steps which had been propped against the stage to +form a bridge over the orchestra pit. + +"Hello, Elsa." + +The late debaters had split into groups. Mr. Bunbury and Gerald were +pacing up and down the central aisle, talking earnestly. Fillmore had +subsided into a chair. + +"Do you know Gladys Winch?" asked Elsa. + +Sally shook hands with the placid lodestar of her brother's affections. +Miss Winch, on closer inspection, proved to have deep grey eyes and +freckles. Sally's liking for her increased. + +"Thank you for saving Fillmore from the wolves," she said. "They would +have torn him in pieces but for you." + +"Oh, I don't know," said Miss Winch. + +"It was noble." + +"Oh, well!" + +"I think," said Sally, "I'll go and have a talk with Fillmore. He looks +as though he wanted consoling." + +She made her way to that picturesque ruin. + + + +4 + + + +Fillmore had the air of a man who thought it wasn't loaded. A wild, +startled expression had settled itself upon his face and he was +breathing heavily. + +"Cheer up!" said Sally. Fillmore jumped like a stricken jelly. "Tell me +all," said Sally, sitting down beside him. "I leave you a gentleman of +large and independent means, and I come back and find you one of the +wage-slaves again. How did it all happen?" + +"Sally," said Fillmore, "I will be frank with you. Can you lend me ten +dollars?" + +"I don't see how you make that out an answer to my question, but here +you are." + +"Thanks." Fillmore pocketed the bill. "I'll let you have it back next +week. I want to take Miss Winch out to lunch." + +"If that's what you want it for, don't look on it as a loan, take it as +a gift with my blessing thrown in." She looked over her shoulder at +Miss Winch, who, the cares of rehearsal being temporarily suspended, was +practising golf-shots with an umbrella at the other side of the stage. +"However did you have the sense to fall in love with her, Fill?" + +"Do you like her?" asked Fillmore, brightening. + +"I love her." + +"I knew you would. She's just the right girl for me, isn't she?" + +"She certainly is." + +"So sympathetic." + +"Yes." + +"So kind." + +"Yes." + +"And she's got brains enough for two, which is the exact quantity the +girl who marries you will need." + +Fillmore drew himself up with as much hauteur as a stout man sitting in +a low chair can achieve. + +"Some day I will make you believe in me, Sally." + +"Less of the Merchant Prince, my lad," said Sally, firmly. "You just +confine yourself to explaining how you got this way, instead of taking +up my valuable time telling me what you mean to do in the future. You've +lost all your money?" + +"I have suffered certain reverses," said Fillmore, with dignity, "which +have left me temporarily... Yes, every bean," he concluded simply. + +"How?" + +"Well..." Fillmore hesitated. "I've had bad luck, you know. First I +bought Consolidated Rails for the rise, and they fell. So that went +wrong." + +"Yes?" + +"And then I bought Russian Roubles for the fall, and they rose. So that +went wrong." + +"Good gracious! Why, I've heard all this before." + +"Who told you?" + +"No, I remember now. It's just that you remind me of a man I met at +Roville. He was telling me the story of his life, and how he had made a +hash of everything. Well, that took all you had, I suppose?" + +"Not quite. I had a few thousand left, and I went into a deal that +really did look cast-iron." + +"And that went wrong!" + +"It wasn't my fault," said Fillmore querulously. "It was just my +poisonous luck. A man I knew got me to join a syndicate which had +bought up a lot of whisky. The idea was to ship it into Chicago in +herring-barrels. We should have cleaned up big, only a mutt of a +detective took it into his darned head to go fooling about with a +crowbar. Officious ass! It wasn't as if the barrels weren't labelled +'Herrings' as plainly as they could be," said Fillmore with honest +indignation. He shuddered. "I nearly got arrested." + +"But that went wrong? Well, that's something to be thankful for. Stripes +wouldn't suit your figure." Sally gave his arm a squeeze. She was +very fond of Fillmore, though for the good of his soul she generally +concealed her affection beneath a manner which he had once compared, +not without some reason, to that of a governess who had afflicted their +mutual childhood. "Never mind, you poor ill-used martyr. Things are sure +to come right. We shall see you a millionaire some day. And, oh heavens, +brother Fillmore, what a bore you'll be when you are! I can just see +you being interviewed and giving hints to young men on how to make good. +'Mr. Nicholas attributes his success to sheer hard work. He can lay his +hand on his bulging waistcoat and say that he has never once indulged in +those rash get-rich-quick speculations, where you buy for the rise and +watch things fall and then rush out and buy for the fall and watch 'em +rise.' Fill... I'll tell you what I'll do. They all say it's the first +bit of money that counts in building a vast fortune. I'll lend you some +of mine." + +"You will? Sally, I always said you were an ace." + +"I never heard you. You oughtn't to mumble so." + +"Will you lend me twenty thousand dollars?" + +Sally patted his hand soothingly. + +"Come slowly down to earth," she said. "Two hundred was the sum I had in +mind." + +"I want twenty thousand." + +"You'd better rob a bank. Any policeman will direct you to a good bank." + +"I'll tell you why I want twenty thousand." + +"You might just mention it." + +"If I had twenty thousand, I'd buy this production from Cracknell. He'll +be back in a few minutes to tell us that the Hobson woman has quit: and, +if she really has, you take it from me that he will close the show. And, +even if he manages to jolly her along this time and she comes back, it's +going to happen sooner or later. It's a shame to let a show like this +close. I believe in it, Sally. It's a darn good play. With Elsa Doland +in the big part, it couldn't fail." + +Sally started. Her money was too recent for her to have grown fully +accustomed to it, and she had never realized that she was in a position +to wave a wand and make things happen on any big scale. The financing of +a theatrical production had always been to her something mysterious +and out of the reach of ordinary persons like herself. Fillmore, that +spacious thinker, had brought it into the sphere of the possible. + +"He'd sell for less than that, of course, but one would need a bit in +hand. You have to face a loss on the road before coming into New York. +I'd give you ten per cent on your money, Sally." + +Sally found herself wavering. The prudent side of her nature, which +hitherto had steered her safely through most of life's rapids, seemed +oddly dormant. Sub-consciously she was aware that on past performances +Fillmore was decidedly not the man to be allowed control of anybody's +little fortune, but somehow the thought did not seem to grip her. He had +touched her imagination. + +"It's a gold-mine!" + +Sally's prudent side stirred in its sleep. Fillmore had chosen an +unfortunate expression. To the novice in finance the word gold-mine +had repellent associations. If there was one thing in which Sally had +proposed not to invest her legacy, it was a gold-mine; what she had had +in view, as a matter of fact, had been one of those little fancy shops +which are called Ye Blue Bird or Ye Corner Shoppe, or something like +that, where you sell exotic bric-a-brac to the wealthy at extortionate +prices. She knew two girls who were doing splendidly in that line. As +Fillmore spoke those words, Ye Corner Shoppe suddenly looked very good +to her. + +At this moment, however, two things happened. Gerald and Mr. Bunbury, +in the course of their perambulations, came into the glow of the +footlights, and she was able to see Gerald's face: and at the same time +Mr. Reginald Cracknell hurried on to the stage, his whole demeanour that +of the bearer of evil tidings. + +The sight of Gerald's face annihilated Sally's prudence at a single +stroke. Ye Corner Shoppe, which a moment before had been shining +brightly before her mental eye, flickered and melted out. The whole +issue became clear and simple. Gerald was miserable and she had it in +her power to make him happy. He was sullenly awaiting disaster and she +with a word could avert it. She wondered that she had ever hesitated. + +"All right," she said simply. + +Fillmore quivered from head to foot. A powerful electric shock could not +have produced a stronger convulsion. He knew Sally of old as cautious +and clear-headed, by no means to be stampeded by a brother's eloquence; +and he had never looked on this thing as anything better than a hundred +to one shot. + +"You'll do it?" he whispered, and held his breath. After all he might +not have heard correctly. + +"Yes." + +All the complex emotion in Fillmore's soul found expression in one vast +whoop. It rang through the empty theatre like the last trump, beating +against the back wall and rising in hollow echoes to the very gallery. +Mr. Bunbury, conversing in low undertones with Mr. Cracknell across the +footlights, shied like a startled mule. There was reproach and menace in +the look he cast at Fillmore, and a minute earlier it would have reduced +that financial magnate to apologetic pulp. But Fillmore was not to +be intimidated now by a look. He strode down to the group at the +footlights, + +"Cracknell," he said importantly, "one moment, I should like a word with +you." + + + + +CHAPTER VII. SOME MEDITATIONS ON SUCCESS + + + +If actors and actresses are like children in that they are readily +depressed by disaster, they have the child's compensating gift of being +easily uplifted by good fortune. It amazed Sally that any one mortal +should have been able to spread such universal happiness as she had +done by the simple act of lending her brother Fillmore twenty thousand +dollars. If the Millennium had arrived, the members of the Primrose +Way Company could not have been on better terms with themselves. The +lethargy and dispiritedness, caused by their week of inaction, fell from +them like a cloak. The sudden elevation of that creature of the abyss, +the assistant stage manager, to the dizzy height of proprietor of the +show appealed to their sense of drama. Most of them had played in pieces +where much the same thing had happened to the persecuted heroine round +about eleven o'clock, and the situation struck them as theatrically +sound. Also, now that she had gone, the extent to which Miss Hobson had +acted as a blight was universally recognized. + +A spirit of optimism reigned, and cheerful rumours became current. The +bowler-hatted Teddy had it straight from the lift-boy at his hotel that +the ban on the theatres was to be lifted on Tuesday at the latest; while +no less an authority than the cigar-stand girl at the Pontchatrain had +informed the man who played the butler that Toledo and Cleveland were +opening to-morrow. It was generally felt that the sun was bursting +through the clouds and that Fate would soon despair of the hopeless task +of trying to keep good men down. + +Fillmore was himself again. We all have our particular mode of +self-expression in moments of elation. Fillmore's took the shape of +buying a new waistcoat and a hundred half-dollar cigars and being very +fussy about what he had for lunch. It may have been an optical illusion, +but he appeared to Sally to put on at least six pounds in weight on the +first day of the new regime. As a serf looking after paper-knives and +other properties, he had been--for him--almost slim. As a manager +he blossomed out into soft billowy curves, and when he stood on the +sidewalk in front of the theatre, gloating over the new posters which +bore the legend, + + FILLMORE NICHOLAS + + PRESENTS + + +the populace had to make a detour to get round him. + +In this era of bubbling joy, it was hard that Sally, the fairy godmother +responsible for it all, should not have been completely happy too; and +it puzzled her why she was not. But whatever it was that cast the faint +shadow refused obstinately to come out from the back of her mind and +show itself and be challenged. It was not till she was out driving in +a hired car with Gerald one afternoon on Belle Isle that enlightenment +came. + +Gerald, since the departure of Miss Hobson, had been at his best. Like +Fillmore, he was a man who responded to the sunshine of prosperity. His +moodiness had vanished, and all his old charm had returned. And yet... +it seemed to Sally, as the car slid smoothly through the pleasant woods +and fields by the river, that there was something that jarred. + +Gerald was cheerful and talkative. He, at any rate, found nothing wrong +with life. He held forth spaciously on the big things he intended to do. + +"If this play get over--and it's going to--I'll show 'em!" His jaw was +squared, and his eyes glowed as they stared into the inviting future. +"One success--that's all I need--then watch me! I haven't had a chance +yet, but..." + +His voice rolled on, but Sally had ceased to listen. It was the time of +year when the chill of evening follows swiftly on the mellow warmth +of afternoon. The sun had gone behind the trees, and a cold wind was +blowing up from the river. And quite suddenly, as though it was the +wind that had cleared her mind, she understood what it was that had been +lurking at the back of her thoughts. For an instant it stood out nakedly +without concealment, and the world became a forlorn place. She had +realized the fundamental difference between man's outlook on life and +woman's. + +Success! How men worshipped it, and how little of themselves they had to +spare for anything else. Ironically, it was the theme of this very play +of Gerald's which she had saved from destruction. Of all the men she +knew, how many had any view of life except as a race which they must +strain every nerve to win, regardless of what they missed by the wayside +in their haste? Fillmore--Gerald--all of them. There might be a woman in +each of their lives, but she came second--an afterthought--a thing for +their spare time. Gerald was everything to her. His success would never +be more than a side-issue as far as she was concerned. He himself, +without any of the trappings of success, was enough for her. But she was +not enough for him. A spasm of futile jealousy shook her. She shivered. + +"Cold?" said Gerald. "I'll tell the man to drive back... I don't see any +reason why this play shouldn't run a year in New York. Everybody says +it's good... if it does get over, they'll all be after me. I..." + +Sally stared out into a bleak world. The sky was a leaden grey, and the +wind from the river blew with a dismal chill. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. REAPPEARANCE OF MR. CARMYLE--AND GINGER + + + +1 + + + +When Sally left Detroit on the following Saturday, accompanied by +Fillmore, who was returning to the metropolis for a few days in order to +secure offices and generally make his presence felt along Broadway, her +spirits had completely recovered. She felt guiltily that she had been +fanciful, even morbid. Naturally men wanted to get on in the world. +It was their job. She told herself that she was bound up with Gerald's +success, and that the last thing of which she ought to complain was the +energy he put into efforts of which she as well as he would reap the +reward. + +To this happier frame of mind the excitement of the last few days had +contributed. Detroit, that city of amiable audiences, had liked "The +Primrose Way." The theatre, in fulfilment of Teddy's prophecy, had +been allowed to open on the Tuesday, and a full house, hungry for +entertainment after its enforced abstinence, had welcomed the play +wholeheartedly. The papers, not always in agreement with the applause of +a first-night audience, had on this occasion endorsed the verdict, with +agreeable unanimity hailing Gerald as the coming author and Elsa Doland +as the coming star. There had even been a brief mention of Fillmore as +the coming manager. But there is always some trifle that jars in our +greatest moments, and Fillmore's triumph had been almost spoilt by the +fact that the only notice taken of Gladys Winch was by the critic who +printed her name--spelt Wunch--in the list of those whom the cast "also +included." + +"One of the greatest character actresses on the stage," said Fillmore +bitterly, talking over this outrage with Sally on the morning after the +production. + +From this blow, however, his buoyant nature had soon enabled him to +rally. Life contained so much that was bright that it would have been +churlish to concentrate the attention on the one dark spot. Business had +been excellent all through the week. Elsa Doland had got better at +every performance. The receipt of a long and agitated telegram from Mr. +Cracknell, pleading to be allowed to buy the piece back, the passage of +time having apparently softened Miss Hobson, was a pleasant incident. +And, best of all, the great Ike Schumann, who owned half the theatres +in New York and had been in Detroit superintending one of his musical +productions, had looked in one evening and stamped "The Primrose Way" +with the seal of his approval. As Fillmore sat opposite Sally on the +train, he radiated contentment and importance. + +"Yes, do," said Sally, breaking a long silence. + +Fillmore awoke from happy dreams. + +"Eh?" + +"I said 'Yes, do.' I think you owe it to your position." + +"Do what?" + +"Buy a fur coat. Wasn't that what you were meditating about?" + +"Don't be a chump," said Fillmore, blushing nevertheless. It was true +that once or twice during the past week he had toyed negligently, as +Mr. Bunbury would have said, with the notion, and why not? A fellow must +keep warm. + +"With an astrakhan collar," insisted Sally. + +"As a matter of fact," said Fillmore loftily, his great soul ill-attuned +to this badinage, "what I was really thinking about at the moment was +something Ike said." + +"Ike?" + +"Ike Schumann. He's on the train. I met him just now." + +"We call him Ike!" + +"Of course I call him Ike," said Fillmore heatedly. "Everyone calls him +Ike." + +"He wears a fur coat," Sally murmured. + +Fillmore registered annoyance. + +"I wish you wouldn't keep on harping on that damned coat. And, anyway, +why shouldn't I have a fur coat?" + +"Fill...! How can you be so brutal as to suggest that I ever said you +shouldn't? Why, I'm one of the strongest supporters of the fur coat. +With big cuffs. And you must roll up Fifth Avenue in your car, and I'll +point and say 'That's my brother!' 'Your brother? No!' 'He is, really.' +'You're joking. Why, that's the great Fillmore Nicholas.' 'I know. But +he really is my brother. And I was with him when he bought that coat.'" + +"Do leave off about the coat!" + +"'And it isn't only the coat,' I shall say. 'It's what's underneath. +Tucked away inside that mass of fur, dodging about behind that dollar +cigar, is one to whom we point with pride... '" + +Fillmore looked coldly at his watch. + +"I've got to go and see Ike Schumann." + +"We are in hourly consultation with Ike." + +"He wants to see me about the show. He suggests putting it into Chicago +before opening in New York." + +"Oh no," cried Sally, dismayed. + +"Why not?" + +Sally recovered herself. Identifying Gerald so closely with his play, +she had supposed for a moment that if the piece opened in Chicago it +would mean a further prolonged separation from him. But of course there +would be no need, she realized, for him to stay with the company after +the first day or two. + +"You're thinking that we ought to have a New York reputation before +tackling Chicago. There's a lot to be said for that. Still, it works +both ways. A Chicago run would help us in New York. Well, I'll have +to think it over," said Fillmore, importantly, "I'll have to think it +over." + +He mused with drawn brows. + +"All wrong," said Sally. + +"Eh?" + +"Not a bit like it. The lips should be compressed and the forefinger of +the right hand laid in a careworn way against the right temple. You've a +lot to learn. Fill." + +"Oh, stop it!" + +"Fillmore Nicholas," said Sally, "if you knew what pain it gives me to +josh my only brother, you'd be sorry for me. But you know it's for your +good. Now run along and put Ike out of his misery. I know he's waiting +for you with his watch out. 'You do think he'll come, Miss Nicholas?' +were his last words to me as he stepped on the train, and oh, Fill, the +yearning in his voice. 'Why, of course he will, Mr. Schumann,' I said. +'For all his exalted position, my brother is kindliness itself. Of +course he'll come.' 'If I could only think so!' he said with a gulp. 'If +I could only think so. But you know what these managers are. A thousand +calls on their time. They get brooding on their fur coats and forget +everything else.' 'Have no fear, Mr. Schumann,' I said. 'Fillmore +Nicholas is a man of his word.'" + +She would have been willing, for she was a girl who never believed in +sparing herself where it was a question of entertaining her nearest and +dearest, to continue the dialogue, but Fillmore was already moving down +the car, his rigid back a silent protest against sisterly levity. Sally +watched him disappear, then picked up a magazine and began to read. + +She had just finished tracking a story of gripping interest through +a jungle of advertisements, only to find that it was in two parts, of +which the one she was reading was the first, when a voice spoke. + +"How do you do, Miss Nicholas?" + +Into the seat before her, recently released from the weight of the +coming manager, Bruce Carmyle of all people in the world insinuated +himself with that well-bred air of deferential restraint which never +left him. + + + +2 + + + +Sally was considerably startled. Everybody travels nowadays, of course, +and there is nothing really remarkable in finding a man in America whom +you had supposed to be in Europe: but nevertheless she was conscious of +a dream-like sensation, as though the clock had been turned back and a +chapter of her life reopened which she had thought closed for ever. + +"Mr. Carmyle!" she cried. + +If Sally had been constantly in Bruce Carmyle's thoughts since they +had parted on the Paris express, Mr. Carmyle had been very little in +Sally's--so little, indeed, that she had had to search her memory for a +moment before she identified him. + +"We're always meeting on trains, aren't we?" she went on, her composure +returning. "I never expected to see you in America." + +"I came over." + +Sally was tempted to reply that she gathered that, but a sudden +embarrassment curbed her tongue. She had just remembered that at their +last meeting she had been abominably rude to this man. She was never +rude to anyone, without subsequent remorse. She contented herself with a +tame "Yes." + +"Yes," said Mr. Carmyle, "it is a good many years since I have taken +a real holiday. My doctor seemed to think I was a trifle run down. It +seemed a good opportunity to visit America. Everybody," said Mr. Carmyle +oracularly, endeavouring, as he had often done since his ship had left +England, to persuade himself that his object in making the trip had not +been merely to renew his acquaintance with Sally, "everybody ought to +visit America at least once. It is part of one's education." + +"And what are your impressions of our glorious country?" said Sally +rallying. + +Mr. Carmyle seemed glad of the opportunity of lecturing on an impersonal +subject. He, too, though his face had shown no trace of it, had been +embarrassed in the opening stages of the conversation. The sound of his +voice restored him. + +"I have been visiting Chicago," he said after a brief travelogue. + +"Oh!" + +"A wonderful city." + +"I've never seen it. I've come from Detroit." + +"Yes, I heard you were in Detroit." + +Sally's eyes opened. + +"You heard I was in Detroit? Good gracious! How?" + +"I--ah--called at your New York address and made inquiries," said Mr. +Carmyle a little awkwardly. + +"But how did you know where I lived?" + +"My cousin--er--Lancelot told me." + +Sally was silent for a moment. She had much the same feeling that +comes to the man in the detective story who realizes that he is being +shadowed. Even if this almost complete stranger had not actually come to +America in direct pursuit of her, there was no disguising the fact that +he evidently found her an object of considerable interest. It was a +compliment, but Sally was not at all sure that she liked it. Bruce +Carmyle meant nothing to her, and it was rather disturbing to find that +she was apparently of great importance to him. She seized on the mention +of Ginger as a lever for diverting the conversation from its present too +intimate course. + +"How is Mr. Kemp?" she asked. + +Mr. Carmyle's dark face seemed to become a trifle darker. + +"We have had no news of him," he said shortly. + +"No news? How do you mean? You speak as though he had disappeared." + +"He has disappeared!" + +"Good heavens! When?" + +"Shortly after I saw you last." + +"Disappeared!" + +Mr. Carmyle frowned. Sally, watching him, found her antipathy stirring +again. There was something about this man which she had disliked +instinctively from the first, a sort of hardness. + +"But where has he gone to?" + +"I don't know." Mr. Carmyle frowned again. The subject of Ginger was +plainly a sore one. "And I don't want to know," he went on heatedly, +a dull flush rising in the cheeks which Sally was sure he had to shave +twice a day. "I don't care to know. The Family have washed their hands +of him. For the future he may look after himself as best he can. I +believe he is off his head." + +Sally's rebellious temper was well ablaze now, but she fought it down. +She would dearly have loved to give battle to Mr. Carmyle--it was odd, +she felt, how she seemed to have constituted herself Ginger's champion +and protector--but she perceived that, if she wished, as she did, to +hear more of her red-headed friend, he must be humoured and conciliated. + +"But what happened? What was all the trouble about?" + +Mr. Carmyle's eyebrows met. + +"He--insulted his uncle. His uncle Donald. He insulted him--grossly. The +one man in the world he should have made a point of--er--" + +"Keeping in with?" + +"Yes. His future depended upon him." + +"But what did he do?" cried Sally, trying hard to keep a thoroughly +reprehensible joy out of her voice. + +"I have heard no details. My uncle is reticent as to what actually +took place. He invited Lancelot to dinner to discuss his plans, and +it appears that Lancelot--defied him. Defied him! He was rude and +insulting. My uncle refuses to have anything more to do with him. +Apparently the young fool managed to win some money at the tables at +Roville, and this seems to have turned his head completely. My uncle +insists that he is mad. I agree with him. Since the night of that dinner +nothing has been heard of Lancelot." + +Mr. Carmyle broke off to brood once more, and before Sally could speak +the impressive bulk of Fillmore loomed up in the aisle beside them. +Explanations seemed to Fillmore to be in order. He cast a questioning +glance at the mysterious stranger, who, in addition to being in +conversation with his sister, had collared his seat. + +"Oh, hullo, Fill," said Sally. "Fillmore, this is Mr. Carmyle. We met +abroad. My brother Fillmore, Mr. Carmyle." + +Proper introduction having been thus effected, Fillmore approved of Mr. +Carmyle. His air of being someone in particular appealed to him. + +"Strange you meeting again like this," he said affably. + +The porter, who had been making up berths along the car, was now +hovering expectantly in the offing. + +"You two had better go into the smoking room," suggested Sally. "I'm +going to bed." + +She wanted to be alone, to think. Mr. Carmyle's tale of a roused and +revolting Ginger had stirred her. + +The two men went off to the smoking-room, and Sally found an empty seat +and sat down to wait for her berth to be made up. She was aglow with a +curious exhilaration. So Ginger had taken her advice! Excellent Ginger! +She felt proud of him. She also had that feeling of complacency, +amounting almost to sinful pride, which comes to those who give advice +and find it acted upon. She had the emotions of a creator. After all, +had she not created this new Ginger? It was she who had stirred him +up. It was she who had unleashed him. She had changed him from a meek +dependent of the Family to a ravening creature, who went about the place +insulting uncles. + +It was a feat, there was no denying it. It was something attempted, +something done: and by all the rules laid down by the poet it should, +therefore, have earned a night's repose. Yet, Sally, jolted by the +train, which towards the small hours seemed to be trying out some new +buck-and-wing steps of its own invention, slept ill, and presently, as +she lay awake, there came to her bedside the Spectre of Doubt, gaunt and +questioning. Had she, after all, wrought so well? Had she been wise in +tampering with this young man's life? + +"What about it?" said the Spectre of Doubt. + + + +3 + + + +Daylight brought no comforting answer to the question. Breakfast failed +to manufacture an easy mind. Sally got off the train, at the Grand +Central station in a state of remorseful concern. She declined the offer +of Mr. Carmyle to drive her to the boarding-house, and started to walk +there, hoping that the crisp morning air would effect a cure. + +She wondered now how she could ever have looked with approval on her +rash act. She wondered what demon of interference and meddling had +possessed her, to make her blunder into people's lives, upsetting them. +She wondered that she was allowed to go around loose. She was nothing +more nor less than a menace to society. Here was an estimable young man, +obviously the sort of young man who would always have to be assisted +through life by his relatives, and she had deliberately egged him on +to wreck his prospects. She blushed hotly as she remembered that mad +wireless she had sent him from the boat. + +Miserable Ginger! She pictured him, his little stock of money gone, +wandering foot-sore about London, seeking in vain for work; forcing +himself to call on Uncle Donald; being thrown down the front steps by +haughty footmen; sleeping on the Embankment; gazing into the dark waters +of the Thames with the stare of hopelessness; climbing to the parapet +and... + +"Ugh!" said Sally. + +She had arrived at the door of the boarding-house, and Mrs. Meecher was +regarding her with welcoming eyes, little knowing that to all practical +intents and purposes she had slain in his prime a red-headed young +man of amiable manners and--when not ill-advised by meddling, muddling +females--of excellent behaviour. + +Mrs. Meecher was friendly and garrulous. Variety, the journal which, +next to the dog Toto, was the thing she loved best in the world, had +informed her on the Friday morning that Mr. Foster's play had got over +big in Detroit, and that Miss Doland had made every kind of hit. It was +not often that the old alumni of the boarding-house forced their +way after this fashion into the Hall of Fame, and, according to Mrs. +Meecher, the establishment was ringing with the news. That blue ribbon +round Toto's neck was worn in honour of the triumph. There was also, +though you could not see it, a chicken dinner in Toto's interior, by way +of further celebration. + +And was it true that Mr. Fillmore had bought the piece? A great man, was +Mrs. Meecher's verdict. Mr. Faucitt had always said so... + +"Oh, how is Mr. Faucitt?" Sally asked, reproaching herself for having +allowed the pressure of other matters to drive all thoughts of her late +patient from her mind. + +"He's gone," said Mrs. Meecher with such relish that to Sally, in her +morbid condition, the words had only one meaning. She turned white and +clutched at the banisters. + +"Gone!" + +"To England," added Mrs. Meecher. Sally was vastly relieved. + +"Oh, I thought you meant..." + +"Oh no, not that." Mrs. Meecher sighed, for she had been a little +disappointed in the old gentleman, who started out as such a promising +invalid, only to fall away into the dullness of robust health once more. +"He's well enough. I never seen anybody better. You'd think," said Mrs. +Meecher, bearing up with difficulty under her grievance, "you'd +think this here new Spanish influenza was a sort of a tonic or +somep'n, the way he looks now. Of course," she added, trying to find +justification for a respected lodger, "he's had good news. His brother's +dead." + +"What!" + +"Not, I don't mean, that that was good news, far from it, though, come +to think of it, all flesh is as grass and we all got to be prepared for +somep'n of the sort breaking loose...but it seems this here new brother +of his--I didn't know he'd a brother, and I don't suppose you knew he +had a brother. Men are secretive, ain't they!--this brother of his +has left him a parcel of money, and Mr. Faucitt he had to get on the +Wednesday boat quick as he could and go right over to the other side to +look after things. Wind up the estate, I believe they call it. Left in a +awful hurry, he did. Sent his love to you and said he'd write. Funny him +having a brother, now, wasn't it? Not," said Mrs. Meecher, at heart a +reasonable woman, "that folks don't have brothers. I got two myself, one +in Portland, Oregon, and the other goodness knows where he is. But what +I'm trying to say..." + +Sally disengaged herself, and went up to her room. For a brief while the +excitement which comes of hearing good news about those of whom we are +fond acted as a stimulant, and she felt almost cheerful. Dear old Mr. +Faucitt. She was sorry for his brother, of course, though she had never +had the pleasure of his acquaintance and had only just heard that he had +ever existed; but it was nice to think that her old friend's remaining +years would be years of affluence. + +Presently, however, she found her thoughts wandering back into their +melancholy groove. She threw herself wearily on the bed. She was tired +after her bad night. + +But she could not sleep. Remorse kept her awake. Besides, she could hear +Mrs. Meecher prowling disturbingly about the house, apparently in search +of someone, her progress indicated by creaking boards and the strenuous +yapping of Toto. + +Sally turned restlessly, and, having turned remained for a long instant +transfixed and rigid. She had seen something, and what she had seen +was enough to surprise any girl in the privacy of her bedroom. From +underneath the bed there peeped coyly forth an undeniably masculine shoe +and six inches of a grey trouser-leg. + +Sally bounded to the floor. She was a girl of courage, and she meant to +probe this matter thoroughly. + +"What are you doing under my bed?" + +The question was a reasonable one, and evidently seemed to the intruder +to deserve an answer. There was a muffled sneeze, and he began to crawl +out. + +The shoe came first. Then the legs. Then a sturdy body in a dusty coat. +And finally there flashed on Sally's fascinated gaze a head of so nearly +the maximum redness that it could only belong to one person in the +world. + +"Ginger!" + +Mr. Lancelot Kemp, on all fours, blinked up at her. + +"Oh, hullo!" he said. + + + + +CHAPTER IX. GINGER BECOMES A RIGHT-HAND MAN + + + +It was not till she saw him actually standing there before her with his +hair rumpled and a large smut on the tip of his nose, that Sally really +understood how profoundly troubled she had been about this young man, +and how vivid had been that vision of him bobbing about on the waters +of the Thames, a cold and unappreciated corpse. She was a girl of keen +imagination, and she had allowed her imagination to riot unchecked. +Astonishment, therefore, at the extraordinary fact of his being there +was for the moment thrust aside by relief. Never before in her life had +she experienced such an overwhelming rush of exhilaration. She flung +herself into a chair and burst into a screech of laughter which even to +her own ears sounded strange. It struck Ginger as hysterical. + +"I say, you know!" said Ginger, as the merriment showed no signs of +abating. Ginger was concerned. Nasty shock for a girl, finding blighters +under her bed. + +Sally sat up, gurgling, and wiped her eyes. + +"Oh, I am glad to see you," she gasped. + +"No, really?" said Ginger, gratified. "That's fine." It occurred to him +that some sort of apology would be a graceful act. "I say, you know, +awfully sorry. About barging in here, I mean. Never dreamed it was your +room. Unoccupied, I thought." + +"Don't mention it. I ought not to have disturbed you. You were having a +nice sleep, of course. Do you always sleep on the floor?" + +"It was like this..." + +"Of course, if you're wearing it for ornament, as a sort of +beauty-spot," said Sally, "all right. But in case you don't know, you've +a smut on your nose." + +"Oh, my aunt! Not really?" + +"Now would I deceive you on an important point like that?" + +"Do you mind if I have a look in the glass?" + +"Certainly, if you can stand it." + +Ginger moved hurriedly to the dressing-table. + +"You're perfectly right," he announced, applying his handkerchief. + +"I thought I was. I'm very quick at noticing things." + +"My hair's a bit rumpled, too." + +"Very much so." + +"You take my tip," said Ginger, earnestly, "and never lie about under +beds. There's nothing in it." + +"That reminds me. You won't be offended if I asked you something?" + +"No, no. Go ahead." + +"It's rather an impertinent question. You may resent it." + +"No, no." + +"Well, then, what were you doing under my bed?" + +"Oh, under your bed?" + +"Yes. Under my bed. This. It's a bed, you know. Mine. My bed. You were +under it. Why? Or putting it another way, why were you under my bed?" + +"I was hiding." + +"Playing hide-and-seek? That explains it." + +"Mrs. What's-her-name--Beecher--Meecher--was after me." + +Sally shook her head disapprovingly. + +"You mustn't encourage Mrs. Meecher in these childish pastimes. It +unsettles her." + +Ginger passed an agitated hand over his forehead. + +"It's like this..." + +"I hate to keep criticizing your appearance," said Sally, "and +personally I like it; but, when you clutched your brow just then, you +put about a pound of dust on it. Your hands are probably grubby." + +Ginger inspected them. + +"They are!" + +"Why not make a really good job of it and have a wash?" + +"Do you mind?" + +"I'd prefer it." + +"Thanks awfully. I mean to say it's your basin, you know, and all that. +What I mean is, seem to be making myself pretty well at home." + +"Oh, no." + +"Touching the matter of soap..." + +"Use mine. We Americans are famous for our hospitality." + +"Thanks awfully." + +"The towel is on your right." + +"Thanks awfully." + +"And I've a clothes brush in my bag." + +"Thanks awfully." + +Splashing followed like a sea-lion taking a dip. "Now, then," said +Sally, "why were you hiding from Mrs. Meecher?" + +A careworn, almost hunted look came into Ginger's face. "I say, you +know, that woman is rather by way of being one of the lads, what! Scares +me! Word was brought that she was on the prowl, so it seemed to me a +judicious move to take cover till she sort of blew over. If she'd found +me, she'd have made me take that dog of hers for a walk." + +"Toto?" + +"Toto. You know," said Ginger, with a strong sense of injury, "no dog's +got a right to be a dog like that. I don't suppose there's anyone +keener on dogs than I am, but a thing like a woolly rat." He shuddered +slightly. "Well, one hates to be seen about with it in the public +streets." + +"Why couldn't you have refused in a firm but gentlemanly manner to take +Toto out?" + +"Ah! There you rather touch the spot. You see, the fact of the matter +is, I'm a bit behind with the rent, and that makes it rather hard to +take what you might call a firm stand." + +"But how can you be behind with the rent? I only left here the Saturday +before last and you weren't in the place then. You can't have been here +more than a week." + +"I've been here just a week. That's the week I'm behind with." + +"But why? You were a millionaire when I left you at Roville." + +"Well, the fact of the matter is, I went back to the tables that night +and lost a goodish bit of what I'd won. And, somehow or another, when I +got to America, the stuff seemed to slip away." + +"What made you come to America at all?" said Sally, asking the question +which, she felt, any sensible person would have asked at the opening of +the conversation. + +One of his familiar blushes raced over Ginger's face. "Oh, I thought I +would. Land of opportunity, you know." + +"Have you managed to find any of the opportunities yet?" + +"Well, I have got a job of sorts, I'm a waiter at a rummy little place +on Second Avenue. The salary isn't big, but I'd have wangled enough out +of it to pay last week's rent, only they docked me a goodish bit for +breaking plates and what not. The fact is, I'm making rather a hash of +it." + +"Oh, Ginger! You oughtn't to be a waiter!" + +"That's what the boss seems to think." + +"I mean, you ought to be doing something ever so much better." + +"But what? You've no notion how well all these blighters here seem to +be able to get along without my help. I've tramped all over the place, +offering my services, but they all say they'll try to carry on as they +are." + +Sally reflected. + +"I know!" + +"What?" + +"I'll make Fillmore give you a job. I wonder I didn't think of it +before." + +"Fillmore?" + +"My brother. Yes, he'll be able to use you." + +"What as?" + +Sally considered. + +"As a--as a--oh, as his right-hand man." + +"Does he want a right-hand man?" + +"Sure to. He's a young fellow trying to get along. Sure to want a +right-hand man." + +"'M yes," said Ginger reflectively. "Of course, I've never been a +right-hand man, you know." + +"Oh, you'd pick it up. I'll take you round to him now. He's staying at +the Astor." + +"There's just one thing," said Ginger. + +"What's that?" + +"I might make a hash of it." + +"Heavens, Ginger! There must be something in this world that you +wouldn't make a hash of. Don't stand arguing any longer. Are you dry? +and clean? Very well, then. Let's be off." + +"Right ho." + +Ginger took a step towards the door, then paused, rigid, with one leg in +the air, as though some spell had been cast upon him. From the passage +outside there had sounded a shrill yapping. Ginger looked at Sally. Then +he looked--longingly--at the bed. + +"Don't be such a coward," said Sally, severely. + +"Yes, but..." + +"How much do you owe Mrs. Meecher?" + +"Round about twelve dollars, I think it is." + +"I'll pay her." + +Ginger flushed awkwardly. + +"No, I'm hanged if you will! I mean," he stammered, "it's frightfully +good of you and all that, and I can't tell you how grateful I am, but +honestly, I couldn't..." + +Sally did not press the point. She liked him the better for a rugged +independence, which in the days of his impecuniousness her brother +Fillmore had never dreamed of exhibiting. + +"Very well," she said. "Have it your own way. Proud. That's me all over, +Mabel. Ginger!" She broke off sharply. "Pull yourself together. Where is +your manly spirit? I'd be ashamed to be such a coward." + +"Awfully sorry, but, honestly, that woolly dog..." + +"Never mind the dog. I'll see you through." + +They came out into the passage almost on top of Toto, who was stalking +phantom rats. Mrs. Meecher was manoeuvring in the background. Her face +lit up grimly at the sight of Ginger. + +"Mister Kemp! I been looking for you." + +Sally intervened brightly. + +"Oh, Mrs. Meecher," she said, shepherding her young charge through the +danger zone, "I was so surprised to meet Mr. Kemp here. He is a great +friend of mine. We met in France. We're going off now to have a long +talk about old times, and then I'm taking him to see my brother..." + +"Toto..." + +"Dear little thing! You ought to take him for a walk," said Sally. "It's +a lovely day. Mr. Kemp was saying just now that he would have liked to +take him, but we're rather in a hurry and shall probably have to get +into a taxi. You've no idea how busy my brother is just now. If we're +late, he'll never forgive us." + +She passed on down the stairs, leaving Mrs. Meecher dissatisfied +but irresolute. There was something about Sally which even in her +pre-wealthy days had always baffled Mrs. Meecher and cramped her style, +and now that she was rich and independent she inspired in the chatelaine +of the boarding-house an emotion which was almost awe. The front door +had closed before Mrs. Meecher had collected her faculties; and Ginger, +pausing on the sidewalk, drew a long breath. + +"You know, you're wonderful!" he said, regarding Sally with unconcealed +admiration. + +She accepted the compliment composedly. + +"Now we'll go and hunt up Fillmore," she said. "But there's no need to +hurry, of course, really. We'll go for a walk first, and then call at +the Astor and make him give us lunch. I want to hear all about you. I've +heard something already. I met your cousin, Mr. Carmyle. He was on the +train coming from Detroit. Did you know that he was in America?" + +"No, I've--er--rather lost touch with the Family." + +"So I gathered from Mr. Carmyle. And I feel hideously responsible. It +was all through me that all this happened." + +"Oh, no." + +"Of course it was. I made you what you are to-day--I hope I'm +satisfied--I dragged and dragged you down until the soul within you +died, so to speak. I know perfectly well that you wouldn't have dreamed +of savaging the Family as you seem to have done if it hadn't been for +what I said to you at Roville. Ginger, tell me, what did happen? I'm +dying to know. Mr. Carmyle said you insulted your uncle!" + +"Donald. Yes, we did have a bit of a scrap, as a matter of fact. He made +me go out to dinner with him and we--er--sort of disagreed. To start +with, he wanted me to apologize to old Scrymgeour, and I rather gave it +a miss." + +"Noble fellow!" + +"Scrymgeour?" + +"No, silly! You." + +"Oh, ah!" Ginger blushed. "And then there was all that about the soup, +you know." + +"How do you mean, 'all that about the soup'? What about the soup? What +soup?" + +"Well, things sort of hotted up a bit when the soup arrived." + +"I don't understand." + +"I mean, the trouble seemed to start, as it were, when the waiter had +finished ladling out the mulligatawny. Thick soup, you know." + +"I know mulligatawny is a thick soup. Yes?" + +"Well, my old uncle--I'm not blaming him, don't you know--more his +misfortune than his fault--I can see that now--but he's got a heavy +moustache. Like a walrus, rather, and he's a bit apt to inhale the stuff +through it. And I--well, I asked him not to. It was just a suggestion, +you know. He cut up fairly rough, and by the time the fish came round +we were more or less down on the mat chewing holes in one another. My +fault, probably. I wasn't feeling particularly well-disposed towards +the Family that night. I'd just had a talk with Bruce--my cousin, you +know--in Piccadilly, and that had rather got the wind up me. Bruce +always seems to get on my nerves a bit somehow and--Uncle Donald asking +me to dinner and all that. By the way, did you get the books?" + +"What books?" + +"Bruce said he wanted to send you some books. That was why I gave him +your address." Sally stared. + +"He never sent me any books." + +"Well, he said he was going to, and I had to tell him where to send +them." + +Sally walked on, a little thoughtfully. She was not a vain girl, but it +was impossible not to perceive in the light of this fresh evidence that +Mr. Carmyle had made a journey of three thousand miles with the sole +object of renewing his acquaintance with her. It did not matter, of +course, but it was vaguely disturbing. No girl cares to be dogged by a +man she rather dislikes. + +"Go on telling me about your uncle," she said. + +"Well, there's not much more to tell. I'd happened to get that wireless +of yours just before I started out to dinner with him, and I was more or +less feeling that I wasn't going to stand any rot from the Family. I'd +got to the fish course, hadn't I? Well, we managed to get through that +somehow, but we didn't survive the fillet steak. One thing seemed to +lead to another, and the show sort of bust up. He called me a good many +things, and I got a bit fed-up, and finally I told him I hadn't any more +use for the Family and was going to start out on my own. And--well, I +did, don't you know. And here I am." + +Sally listened to this saga breathlessly. More than ever did she feel +responsible for her young protégé, and any faint qualms which she had +entertained as to the wisdom of transferring practically the whole +of her patrimony to the care of so erratic a financier as her brother +vanished. It was her plain duty to see that Ginger was started well in +the race of life, and Fillmore was going to come in uncommonly handy. + +"We'll go to the Astor now," she said, "and I'll introduce you to +Fillmore. He's a theatrical manager and he's sure to have something for +you." + +"It's awfully good of you to bother about me." + +"Ginger," said Sally, "I regard you as a grandson. Hail that cab, will +you?" + + + + +CHAPTER X. SALLY IN THE SHADOWS + + + +1 + + + +It seemed to Sally in the weeks that followed her reunion with Ginger +Kemp that a sort of golden age had set in. On all the frontiers of her +little kingdom there was peace and prosperity, and she woke each morning +in a world so neatly smoothed and ironed out that the most captious +pessimist could hardly have found anything in it to criticize. + +True, Gerald was still a thousand miles away. Going to Chicago to +superintend the opening of "The Primrose Way"; for Fillmore had acceded +to his friend Ike's suggestion in the matter of producing it first in +Chicago, and he had been called in by a distracted manager to revise the +work of a brother dramatist, whose comedy was in difficulties at one of +the theatres in that city; and this meant he would have to remain on +the spot for some time to come. It was disappointing, for Sally had been +looking forward to having him back in New York in a few days; but she +refused to allow herself to be depressed. Life as a whole was much +too satisfactory for that. Life indeed, in every other respect, seemed +perfect. Fillmore was going strong; Ginger was off her conscience; she +had found an apartment; her new hat suited her; and "The Primrose Way" +was a tremendous success. Chicago, it appeared from Fillmore's account, +was paying little attention to anything except "The Primrose Way." +National problems had ceased to interest the citizens. Local problems +left them cold. Their minds were riveted to the exclusion of all else +on the problem of how to secure seats. The production of the piece, +according to Fillmore, had been the most terrific experience that had +come to stir Chicago since the great fire. + +Of all these satisfactory happenings, the most satisfactory, to Sally's +thinking, was the fact that the problem of Ginger's future had been +solved. Ginger had entered the service of the Fillmore Nicholas +Theatrical Enterprises Ltd. (Managing Director, Fillmore +Nicholas)--Fillmore would have made the title longer, only that was all +that would go on the brass plate--and was to be found daily in the outer +office, his duties consisting mainly, it seemed, in reading the evening +papers. What exactly he was, even Ginger hardly knew. Sometimes he felt +like the man at the wheel, sometimes like a glorified office boy, and +not so very glorified at that. For the most part he had to prevent the +mob rushing and getting at Fillmore, who sat in semi-regal state in the +inner office pondering great schemes. + +But, though there might be an occasional passing uncertainty in Ginger's +mind as to just what he was supposed to be doing in exchange for the +fifty dollars he drew every Friday, there was nothing uncertain about +his gratitude to Sally for having pulled the strings and enabled him to +do it. He tried to thank her every time they met, and nowadays they +were meeting frequently; for Ginger was helping her to furnish her new +apartment. In this task, he spared no efforts. He said that it kept him +in condition. + +"And what I mean to say is," said Ginger, pausing in the act of carrying +a massive easy chair to the third spot which Sally had selected in the +last ten minutes, "if I didn't sweat about a bit and help you after the +way you got me that job..." + +"Ginger, desist," said Sally. + +"Yes, but honestly..." + +"If you don't stop it, I'll make you move that chair into the next +room." + +"Shall I?" Ginger rubbed his blistered hands and took a new grip. +"Anything you say." + +"Silly! Of course not. The only other rooms are my bedroom, the bathroom +and the kitchen. What on earth would I want a great lumbering chair in +them for? All the same, I believe the first we chose was the best." + +"Back she goes, then, what?" + +Sally reflected frowningly. This business of setting up house was +causing her much thought. + +"No," she decided. "By the window is better." She looked at him +remorsefully. "I'm giving you a lot of trouble." + +"Trouble!" Ginger, accompanied by a chair, staggered across the room. +"The way I look at it is this." He wiped a bead of perspiration from his +freckled forehead. "You got me that job, and..." + +"Stop!" + +"Right ho... Still, you did, you know." + +Sally sat down in the armchair and stretched herself. Watching Ginger +work had given her a vicarious fatigue. She surveyed the room proudly. +It was certainly beginning to look cosy. The pictures were up, the +carpet down, the furniture very neatly in order. For almost the first +time in her life she had the restful sensation of being at home. She had +always longed, during the past three years of boarding-house existence, +for a settled abode, a place where she could lock the door on herself +and be alone. The apartment was small, but it was undeniably a haven. +She looked about her and could see no flaw in it... except... She had a +sudden sense of something missing. + +"Hullo!" she said. "Where's that photograph of me? I'm sure I put it on +the mantelpiece yesterday." + +His exertions seemed to have brought the blood to Ginger's face. He was +a rich red. He inspected the mantelpiece narrowly. + +"No. No photograph here." + +"I know there isn't. But it was there yesterday. Or was it? I know I +meant to put it there. Perhaps I forgot. It's the most beautiful thing +you ever saw. Not a bit like me; but what of that? They touch 'em up in +the dark-room, you know. I value it because it looks the way I should +like to look if I could." + +"I've never had a beautiful photograph taken of myself," said Ginger, +solemnly, with gentle regret. + +"Cheer up!" + +"Oh, I don't mind. I only mentioned..." + +"Ginger," said Sally, "pardon my interrupting your remarks, which I know +are valuable, but this chair is--not--right! It ought to be where it was +at the beginning. Could you give your imitation of a pack-mule just +once more? And after that I'll make you some tea. If there's any tea--or +milk--or cups." + +"There are cups all right. I know, because I smashed two the day before +yesterday. I'll nip round the corner for some milk, shall I?" + +"Yes, please nip. All this hard work has taken it out of me terribly." + +Over the tea-table Sally became inquisitive. + +"What I can't understand about this job of yours. Ginger--which as you +are just about to observe, I was noble enough to secure for you--is the +amount of leisure that seems to go with it. How is it that you are able +to spend your valuable time--Fillmore's valuable time, rather--juggling +with my furniture every day?" + +"Oh, I can usually get off." + +"But oughtn't you to be at your post doing--whatever it is you do? What +do you do?" + +Ginger stirred his tea thoughtfully and gave his mind to the question. + +"Well, I sort of mess about, you know." He pondered. "I interview divers +blighters and tell 'em your brother is out and take their names and +addresses and... oh, all that sort of thing." + +"Does Fillmore consult you much?" + +"He lets me read some of the plays that are sent in. Awful tosh most of +them. Sometimes he sends me off to a vaudeville house of an evening." + +"As a treat?" + +"To see some special act, you know. To report on it. In case he might +want to use it for this revue of his." + +"Which revue?" + +"Didn't you know he was going to put on a revue? Oh, rather. A whacking +big affair. Going to cut out the Follies and all that sort of thing." + +"But--my goodness!" Sally was alarmed. It was just like Fillmore, she +felt, to go branching out into these expensive schemes when he ought to +be moving warily and trying to consolidate the small success he had had. +All his life he had thought in millions where the prudent man would have +been content with hundreds. An inexhaustible fount of optimism bubbled +eternally within him. "That's rather ambitious," she said. + +"Yes. Ambitious sort of cove, your brother. Quite the Napoleon." + +"I shall have to talk to him," said Sally decidedly. She was annoyed +with Fillmore. Everything had been going so beautifully, with everybody +peaceful and happy and prosperous and no anxiety anywhere, till he had +spoiled things. Now she would have to start worrying again. + +"Of course," argued Ginger, "there's money in revues. Over in London +fellows make pots out of them." + +Sally shook her head. + +"It won't do," she said. "And I'll tell you another thing that won't do. +This armchair. Of course it ought to be over by the window. You can see +that yourself, can't you." + +"Absolutely!" said Ginger, patiently preparing for action once more. + + + +2 + + + +Sally's anxiety with regard to her ebullient brother was not lessened by +the receipt shortly afterwards of a telegram from Miss Winch in Chicago. + +Have you been feeding Fillmore meat? + +the telegram ran: and, while Sally could not have claimed that she +completely understood it, there was a sinister suggestion about +the message which decided her to wait no longer before making +investigations. She tore herself away from the joys of furnishing and +went round to the headquarters of the Fillmore Nicholas Theatrical +Enterprises Ltd. (Managing Director, Fillmore Nicholas) without delay. + +Ginger, she discovered on arrival, was absent from his customary post, +his place in the outer office being taken by a lad of tender years and +pimply exterior, who thawed and cast off a proud reserve on hearing +Sally's name, and told her to walk right in. Sally walked right in, and +found Fillmore with his feet on an untidy desk, studying what appeared +to be costume-designs. + +"Ah, Sally!" he said in the distrait, tired voice which speaks of vast +preoccupations. Prosperity was still putting in its silent, deadly work +on the Hope of the American Theatre. What, even at as late an epoch as +the return from Detroit, had been merely a smooth fullness around the +angle of the jaw was now frankly and without disguise a double chin. He +was wearing a new waistcoat and it was unbuttoned. "I am rather busy," +he went on. "Always glad to see you, but I am rather busy. I have a +hundred things to attend to." + +"Well, attend to me. That'll only make a hundred and one. Fill, what's +all this I hear about a revue?" + +Fillmore looked as like a small boy caught in the act of stealing jam +as it is possible for a great theatrical manager to look. He had been +wondering in his darker moments what Sally would say about that project +when she heard of it, and he had hoped that she would not hear of it +until all the preparations were so complete that interference would be +impossible. He was extremely fond of Sally, but there was, he knew, +a lamentable vein of caution in her make-up which might lead her to +criticize. And how can your man of affairs carry on if women are buzzing +round criticizing all the time? He picked up a pen and put it down; +buttoned his waistcoat and unbuttoned it; and scratched his ear with one +of the costume-designs. + +"Oh yes, the revue!" + +"It's no good saying 'Oh yes'! You know perfectly well it's a crazy +idea." + +"Really... these business matters... this interference..." + +"I don't want to run your affairs for you, Fill, but that money of mine +does make me a sort of partner, I suppose, and I think I have a right to +raise a loud yell of agony when I see you risking it on a..." + +"Pardon me," said Fillmore loftily, looking happier. "Let me explain. +Women never understand business matters. Your money is tied up +exclusively in 'The Primrose Way,' which, as you know, is a tremendous +success. You have nothing whatever to worry about as regards any new +production I may make." + +"I'm not worrying about the money. I'm worrying about you." + +A tolerant smile played about the lower slopes of Fillmore's face. + +"Don't be alarmed about me. I'm all right." + +"You aren't all right. You've no business, when you've only just got +started as a manager, to be rushing into an enormous production like +this. You can't afford it." + +"My dear child, as I said before, women cannot understand these things. +A man in my position can always command money for a new venture." + +"Do you mean to say you have found somebody silly enough to put up +money?" + +"Certainly. I don't know that there is any secret about it. Your +friend, Mr. Carmyle, has taken an interest in some of my forthcoming +productions." + +"What!" Sally had been disturbed before, but she was aghast now. + +This was something she had never anticipated. Bruce Carmyle seemed to be +creeping into her life like an advancing tide. There appeared to be no +eluding him. Wherever she turned, there he was, and she could do nothing +but rage impotently. The situation was becoming impossible. + +Fillmore misinterpreted the note of dismay in her voice. + +"It's quite all right," he assured her. "He's a very rich man. Large +private means, besides his big income. Even if anything goes wrong..." + +"It isn't that. It's..." + +The hopelessness of explaining to Fillmore stopped Sally. And while she +was chafing at this new complication which had come to upset the orderly +routine of her life there was an outburst of voices in the other office. +Ginger's understudy seemed to be endeavouring to convince somebody that +the Big Chief was engaged and not to be intruded upon. In this he was +unsuccessful, for the door opened tempestuously and Miss Winch sailed +in. + +"Fillmore, you poor nut," said Miss Winch, for though she might wrap up +her meaning somewhat obscurely in her telegraphic communications, when +it came to the spoken word she was directness itself, "stop picking +straws in your hair and listen to me. You're dippy!" + +The last time Sally had seen Fillmore's fiancée, she had been impressed +by her imperturbable calm. Miss Winch, in Detroit, had seemed a girl +whom nothing could ruffle. That she had lapsed now from this serene +placidity, struck Sally as ominous. Slightly though she knew her, she +felt that it could be no ordinary happening that had so animated her +sister-in-law-to-be. + +"Ah! Here you are!" said Fillmore. He had started to his feet +indignantly at the opening of the door, like a lion bearded in its den, +but calm had returned when he saw who the intruder was. + +"Yes, here I am!" Miss Winch dropped despairingly into a swivel-chair, +and endeavoured to restore herself with a stick of chewing-gum. +"Fillmore, darling, you're the sweetest thing on earth, and I love you, +but on present form you could just walk straight into Bloomingdale and +they'd give you the royal suite." + +"My dear girl..." + +"What do you think?" demanded Miss Winch, turning to Sally. + +"I've just been telling him," said Sally, welcoming this ally, "I +think it's absurd at this stage of things for him to put on an enormous +revue..." + +"Revue?" Miss Winch stopped in the act of gnawing her gum. "What revue?" +She flung up her arms. "I shall have to swallow this gum," she said. +"You can't chew with your head going round. Are you putting on a revue +too?" + +Fillmore was buttoning and unbuttoning his waistcoat. He had a hounded +look. + +"Certainly, certainly," he replied in a tone of some feverishness. "I +wish you girls would leave me to manage..." + +"Dippy!" said Miss Winch once more. "Telegraphic address: Tea-Pot, +Matteawan." She swivelled round to Sally again. "Say, listen! This boy +must be stopped. We must form a gang in his best interests and get +him put away. What do you think he proposes doing? I'll give you three +guesses. Oh, what's the use? You'd never hit it. This poor wandering lad +has got it all fixed up to star me--me--in a new show!" + +Fillmore removed a hand from his waistcoat buttons and waved it +protestingly. + +"I have used my own judgment..." + +"Yes, sir!" proceeded Miss Winch, riding over the interruption. "That's +what he's planning to spring on an unsuspicious public. I'm sitting +peacefully in my room at the hotel in Chicago, pronging a few cents' +worth of scrambled eggs and reading the morning paper, when the +telephone rings. Gentleman below would like to see me. Oh, ask him to +wait. Business of flinging on a few clothes. Down in elevator. Bright +sunrise effects in lobby." + +"What on earth do you mean?" + +"The gentleman had a head of red hair which had to be seen to be +believed," explained Miss Winch. "Lit up the lobby. Management had +switched off all the electrics for sake of economy. An Englishman he +was. Nice fellow. Named Kemp." + +"Oh, is Ginger in Chicago?" said Sally. "I wondered why he wasn't on his +little chair in the outer office. + +"I sent Kemp to Chicago," said Fillmore, "to have a look at the show. It +is my policy, if I am unable to pay periodical visits myself, to send a +representative..." + +"Save it up for the long winter evenings," advised Miss Winch, cutting +in on this statement of managerial tactics. "Mr. Kemp may have been +there to look at the show, but his chief reason for coming was to tell +me to beat it back to New York to enter into my kingdom. Fillmore wanted +me on the spot, he told me, so that I could sit around in this office +here, interviewing my supporting company. Me! Can you or can you not," +inquired Miss Winch frankly, "tie it?" + +"Well..." Sally hesitated. + +"Don't say it! I know it just as well as you do. It's too sad for +words." + +"You persist in underestimating your abilities, Gladys," said Fillmore +reproachfully. "I have had a certain amount of experience in theatrical +matters--I have seen a good deal of acting--and I assure you that as a +character-actress you..." + +Miss Winch rose swiftly from her seat, kissed Fillmore energetically, +and sat down again. She produced another stick of chewing-gum, then +shook her head and replaced it in her bag. + +"You're a darling old thing to talk like that," she said, "and I hate to +wake you out of your daydreams, but, honestly, Fillmore, dear, do just +step out of the padded cell for one moment and listen to reason. I know +exactly what has been passing in your poor disordered bean. You took +Elsa Doland out of a minor part and made her a star overnight. She goes +to Chicago, and the critics and everybody else rave about her. As a +matter of fact," she said to Sally with enthusiasm, for hers was an +honest and generous nature, "you can't realize, not having seen her +play there, what an amazing hit she has made. She really is a sensation. +Everybody says she's going to be the biggest thing on record. Very +well, then, what does Fillmore do? The poor fish claps his hand to his +forehead and cries 'Gadzooks! An idea! I've done it before, I'll do it +again. I'm the fellow who can make a star out of anything.' And he picks +on me!" + +"My dear girl..." + +"Now, the flaw in the scheme is this. Elsa is a genius, and if he hadn't +made her a star somebody else would have done. But little Gladys? That's +something else again." She turned to Sally. "You've seen me in action, +and let me tell you you've seen me at my best. Give me a maid's part, +with a tray to carry on in act one and a couple of 'Yes, madam's' in act +two, and I'm there! Ellen Terry hasn't anything on me when it comes to +saying 'Yes, madam,' and I'm willing to back myself for gold, notes, +or lima beans against Sarah Bernhardt as a tray-carrier. But there I +finish. That lets me out. And anybody who thinks otherwise is going to +lose a lot of money. Between ourselves the only thing I can do really +well is to cook..." + +"My dear Gladys!" cried Fillmore revolted. + +"I'm a heaven-born cook, and I don't mind notifying the world to that +effect. I can cook a chicken casserole so that you would leave home and +mother for it. Also my English pork-pies! One of these days I'll take +an afternoon off and assemble one for you. You'd be surprised! But +acting--no. I can't do it, and I don't want to do it. I only went on the +stage for fun, and my idea of fun isn't to plough through a star part +with all the critics waving their axes in the front row, and me knowing +all the time that it's taking money out of Fillmore's bankroll that +ought to be going towards buying the little home with stationary +wash-tubs... Well, that's that, Fillmore, old darling. I thought I'd +just mention it." + +Sally could not help being sorry for Fillmore. He was sitting with his +chin on his hands, staring moodily before him--Napoleon at Elba. It was +plain that this project of taking Miss Winch by the scruff of the neck +and hurling her to the heights had been very near his heart. + +"If that's how you feel," he said in a stricken voice, "there is nothing +more to say." + +"Oh, yes there is. We will now talk about this revue of yours. It's +off!" + +Fillmore bounded to his feet; he thumped the desk with a well-nourished +fist. A man can stand just so much. + +"It is not off! Great heavens! It's too much! I will not put up with +this interference with my business concerns. I will not be tied and +hampered. Here am I, a man of broad vision and... and... broad vision... +I form my plans... my plans... I form them... I shape my schemes... and +what happens? A horde of girls flock into my private office while I +am endeavouring to concentrate... and concentrate... I won't stand it. +Advice, yes. Interference, no. I... I... I... and kindly remember that!" + +The door closed with a bang. A fainter detonation announced the +whirlwind passage through the outer office. Footsteps died away down the +corridor. + +Sally looked at Miss Winch, stunned. A roused and militant Fillmore was +new to her. + +Miss Winch took out the stick of chewing-gum again and unwrapped it. + +"Isn't he cute!" she said. "I hope he doesn't get the soft kind," she +murmured, chewing reflectively. + +"The soft kind." + +"He'll be back soon with a box of candy," explained Miss Winch, "and he +will get that sloshy, creamy sort, though I keep telling him I like the +other. Well, one thing's certain. Fillmore's got it up his nose. He's +beginning to hop about and sing in the sunlight. It's going to be hard +work to get that boy down to earth again." Miss Winch heaved a gentle +sigh. "I should like him to have enough left in the old stocking to +pay the first year's rent when the wedding bells ring out." She bit +meditatively on her chewing-gum. "Not," she said, "that it matters. I'd +be just as happy in two rooms and a kitchenette, so long as Fillmore +was there. You've no notion how dippy I am about him." Her freckled face +glowed. "He grows on me like a darned drug. And the funny thing is that +I keep right on admiring him though I can see all the while that he's +the most perfect chump. He is a chump, you know. That's what I love +about him. That and the way his ears wiggle when he gets excited. Chumps +always make the best husbands. When you marry, Sally, grab a chump. +Tap his forehead first, and if it rings solid, don't hesitate. All the +unhappy marriages come from the husband having brains. What good are +brains to a man? They only unsettle him." She broke off and scrutinized +Sally closely. "Say, what do you do with your skin?" + +She spoke with solemn earnestness which made Sally laugh. + +"What do I do with my skin? I just carry it around with me." + +"Well," said Miss Winch enviously, "I wish I could train my darned fool +of a complexion to get that way. Freckles are the devil. When I was +eight I had the finest collection in the Middle West, and I've been +adding to it right along. Some folks say lemon-juice'll cure 'em. Mine +lap up all I give 'em and ask for more. There's only one way of getting +rid of freckles, and that is to saw the head off at the neck." + +"But why do you want to get rid of them?" + +"Why? Because a sensitive girl, anxious to retain her future husband's +love, doesn't enjoy going about looking like something out of a dime +museum." + +"How absurd! Fillmore worships freckles." + +"Did he tell you so?" asked Miss Winch eagerly. + +"Not in so many words, but you can see it in his eye." + +"Well, he certainly asked me to marry him, knowing all about them, I +will say that. And, what's more, I don't think feminine loveliness +means much to Fillmore, or he'd never have picked on me. Still, it is +calculated to give a girl a jar, you must admit, when she picks up a +magazine and reads an advertisement of a face-cream beginning, 'Your +husband is growing cold to you. Can you blame him? Have you really tried +to cure those unsightly blemishes?'--meaning what I've got. Still, I +haven't noticed Fillmore growing cold to me, so maybe it's all right." + +It was a subdued Sally who received Ginger when he called at her +apartment a few days later on his return from Chicago. It seemed to her, +thinking over the recent scene, that matters were even worse than +she had feared. This absurd revue, which she had looked on as a mere +isolated outbreak of foolishness, was, it would appear, only a specimen +of the sort of thing her misguided brother proposed to do, a sample +selected at random from a wholesale lot of frantic schemes. Fillmore, +there was no longer any room for doubt, was preparing to express +his great soul on a vast scale. And she could not dissuade him. A +humiliating thought. She had grown so accustomed through the years to +being the dominating mind that this revolt from her authority made her +feel helpless and inadequate. Her self-confidence was shaken. + +And Bruce Carmyle was financing him... It was illogical, but Sally could +not help feeling that when--she had not the optimism to say "if"--he +lost his money, she would somehow be under an obligation to him, as +if the disaster had been her fault. She disliked, with a whole-hearted +intensity, the thought of being under an obligation to Mr. Carmyle. + +Ginger said he had looked in to inspect the furniture on the chance that +Sally might want it shifted again: but Sally had no criticisms to make +on that subject. Weightier matters occupied her mind. She sat Ginger +down in the armchair and started to pour out her troubles. It soothed +her to talk to him. In a world which had somehow become chaotic again +after an all too brief period of peace, he was solid and consoling. + +"I shouldn't worry," observed Ginger with Winch-like calm, when she had +finished drawing for him the picture of a Fillmore rampant against a +background of expensive revues. Sally nearly shook him. + +"It's all very well to tell me not to worry," she cried. "How can I help +worrying? Fillmore's simply a baby, and he's just playing the fool. He +has lost his head completely. And I can't stop him! That is the awful +part of it. I used to be able to look him in the eye, and he would +wag his tail and crawl back into his basket, but now I seem to have no +influence at all over him. He just snorts and goes on running round in +circles, breathing fire." + +Ginger did not abandon his attempts to indicate the silver lining. + +"I think you are making too much of all this, you know. I mean to say, +it's quite likely he's found some mug... what I mean is, it's just +possible that your brother isn't standing the entire racket himself. +Perhaps some rich Johnnie has breezed along with a pot of money. It +often happens like that, you know. You read in the paper that some +manager or other is putting on some show or other, when really the chap +who's actually supplying the pieces of eight is some anonymous lad in +the background." + +"That is just what has happened, and it makes it worse than ever. +Fillmore tells me that your cousin, Mr. Carmyle, is providing the +money." + +This did interest Ginger. He sat up with a jerk. + +"Oh, I say!" he exclaimed. + +"Yes," said Sally, still agitated but pleased that she had at last +shaken him out of his trying attitude of detachment. + +Ginger was scowling. + +"That's a bit off," he observed. + +"I think so, too." + +"I don't like that." + +"Nor do I." + +"Do you know what I think?" said Ginger, ever a man of plain speech and +a reckless plunger into delicate subjects. "The blighter's in love with +you." + +Sally flushed. After examining the evidence before her, she had reached +the same conclusion in the privacy of her thoughts, but it embarrassed +her to hear the thing put into bald words. + +"I know Bruce," continued Ginger, "and, believe me, he isn't the sort of +cove to take any kind of flutter without a jolly good motive. Of course, +he's got tons of money. His old guvnor was the Carmyle of Carmyle, Brent +& Co.--coal mines up in Wales, and all that sort of thing--and I suppose +he must have left Bruce something like half a million. No need for the +fellow to have worked at all, if he hadn't wanted to. As far as having +the stuff goes, he's in a position to back all the shows he wants to. +But the point is, it's right out of his line. He doesn't do that sort +of thing. Not a drop of sporting blood in the chap. Why I've known him +stick the whole family on to me just because it got noised about that +I'd dropped a couple of quid on the Grand National. If he's really +brought himself to the point of shelling out on a risky proposition like +a show, it means something, take my word for it. And I don't see what +else it can mean except... well, I mean to say, is it likely that he's +doing it simply to make your brother look on him as a good egg and a +pal, and all that sort of thing?" + +"No, it's not," agreed Sally. "But don't let's talk about it any more. +Tell me all about your trip to Chicago." + +"All right. But, returning to this binge for a moment, I don't see +how it matters to you one way or the other. You're engaged to another +fellow, and when Bruce rolls up and says: 'What about it?' you've simply +to tell him that the shot isn't on the board and will he kindly melt +away. Then you hand him his hat and out he goes." + +Sally gave a troubled laugh. + +"You think that's simple, do you? I suppose you imagine that a girl +enjoys that sort of thing? Oh, what's the use of talking about it? It's +horrible, and no amount of arguing will make it anything else. Do let's +change the subject. How did you like Chicago?" + +"Oh, all right. Rather a grubby sort of place." + +"So I've always heard. But you ought not to mind that, being a +Londoner." + +"Oh, I didn't mind it. As a matter of fact, I had rather a good time. +Saw one or two shows, you know. Got in on my face as your brother's +representative, which was all to the good. By the way, it's rummy how +you run into people when you move about, isn't it?" + +"You talk as if you had been dashing about the streets with your eyes +shut. Did you meet somebody you knew?" + +"Chap I hadn't seen for years. Was at school with him, as a matter of +fact. Fellow named Foster. But I expect you know him, too, don't you? By +name, at any rate. He wrote your brother's show." + +Sally's heart jumped. + +"Oh! Did you meet Gerald--Foster?" + +"Ran into him one night at the theatre." + +"And you were really at school with him?" + +"Yes. He was in the footer team with me my last year." + +"Was he a scrum-half, too?" asked Sally, dimpling. + +Ginger looked shocked. + +"You don't have two scrum-halves in a team," he said, pained at this +ignorance on a vital matter. "The scrum-half is the half who works the +scrum and..." + +"Yes, you told me that at Roville. What was Gerald--Mr. Foster then? A +six and seven-eighths, or something?" + +"He was a wing-three," said Ginger with a gravity befitting his theme. +"Rather fast, with a fairly decent swerve. But he would not learn to +give the reverse pass inside to the centre." + +"Ghastly!" said Sally. + +"If," said Ginger earnestly, "a wing's bottled up by his wing and the +back, the only thing he can do, if he doesn't want to be bundled into +touch, is to give the reverse pass." + +"I know," said Sally. "If I've thought that once, I've thought it a +hundred times. How nice it must have been for you meeting again. I +suppose you had all sorts of things to talk about?" + +Ginger shook his head. + +"Not such a frightful lot. We were never very thick. You see, this chap +Foster was by way of being a bit of a worm." + +"What!" + +"A tick," explained Ginger. "A rotter. He was pretty generally barred at +school. Personally, I never had any use for him at all." + +Sally stiffened. She had liked Ginger up to that moment, and later on, +no doubt, she would resume her liking for him: but in the immediate +moment which followed these words she found herself regarding him with +stormy hostility. How dare he sit there saying things like that about +Gerald? + +Ginger, who was lighting a cigarette without a care in the world, +proceeded to develop his theme. + +"It's a rummy thing about school. Generally, if a fellow's good at +games--in the cricket team or the footer team and so forth--he +can hardly help being fairly popular. But this blighter Foster +somehow--nobody seemed very keen on him. Of course, he had a few of his +own pals, but most of the chaps rather gave him a miss. It may have been +because he was a bit sidey... had rather an edge on him, you know... +Personally, the reason I barred him was because he wasn't straight. +You didn't notice it if you weren't thrown a goodish bit with him, of +course, but he and I were in the same house, and..." + +Sally managed to control her voice, though it shook a little. + +"I ought to tell you," she said, and her tone would have warned him had +he been less occupied, "that Mr. Foster is a great friend of mine." + +But Ginger was intent on the lighting of his cigarette, a delicate +operation with the breeze blowing in through the open window. His head +was bent, and he had formed his hands into a protective framework which +half hid his face. + +"If you take my tip," he mumbled, "you'll drop him. He's a wrong 'un." + +He spoke with the absent-minded drawl of preoccupation, and Sally could +keep the conflagration under no longer. She was aflame from head to +foot. + +"It may interest you to know," she said, shooting the words out like +bullets from between clenched teeth, "that Gerald Foster is the man I am +engaged to marry." + +Ginger's head came slowly up from his cupped hands. Amazement was in his +eyes, and a sort of horror. The cigarette hung limply from his mouth. He +did not speak, but sat looking at her, dazed. Then the match burnt his +fingers, and he dropped it with a start. The sharp sting of it seemed to +wake him. He blinked. + +"You're joking," he said, feebly. There was a note of wistfulness in his +voice. "It isn't true?" + +Sally kicked the leg of her chair irritably. She read insolent +disapproval into the words. He was daring to criticize... + +"Of course it's true..." + +"But..." A look of hopeless misery came into Ginger's pleasant face. He +hesitated. Then, with the air of a man bracing himself to a dreadful, +but unavoidable, ordeal, he went on. He spoke gruffly, and his eyes, +which had been fixed on Sally's, wandered down to the match on the +carpet. It was still glowing, and mechanically he put a foot on it. + +"Foster's married," he said shortly. "He was married the day before I +left Chicago." + + + +3 + + + +It seemed to Ginger that in the silence which followed, brooding over +the room like a living presence, even the noises in the street had +ceased, as though what he had said had been a spell cutting Sally +and himself off from the outer world. Only the little clock on the +mantelpiece ticked--ticked--ticked, like a heart beating fast. + +He stared straight before him, conscious of a strange rigidity. He felt +incapable of movement, as he had sometimes felt in nightmares; and not +for all the wealth of America could he have raised his eyes just then to +Sally's face. He could see her hands. They had tightened on the arm of +the chair. The knuckles were white. + +He was blaming himself bitterly now for his oafish clumsiness in +blurting out the news so abruptly. And yet, curiously, in his remorse +there was something of elation. Never before had he felt so near to her. +It was as though a barrier that had been between them had fallen. + +Something moved... It was Sally's hand, slowly relaxing. The fingers +loosened their grip, tightened again, then, as if reluctantly relaxed +once more. The blood flowed back. + +"Your cigarette's out." + +Ginger started violently. Her voice, coming suddenly out of the silence, +had struck him like a blow. + +"Oh, thanks!" + +He forced himself to light another match. It sputtered noisily in the +stillness. He blew it out, and the uncanny quiet fell again. + +Ginger drew at his cigarette mechanically. For an instant he had seen +Sally's face, white-cheeked and bright-eyed, the chin tilted like a flag +flying over a stricken field. His mood changed. All his emotions had +crystallized into a dull, futile rage, a helpless fury directed at a man +a thousand miles away. + +Sally spoke again. Her voice sounded small and far off, an odd flatness +in it. + +"Married?" + +Ginger threw his cigarette out of the window. He was shocked to find +that he was smoking. Nothing could have been farther from his intention +than to smoke. He nodded. + +"Whom has he married?" + +Ginger coughed. Something was sticking in his throat, and speech was +difficult. + +"A girl called Doland." + +"Oh, Elsa Doland?" + +"Yes." + +"Elsa Doland." Sally drummed with her fingers on the arm of the chair. +"Oh, Elsa Doland?" + +There was silence again. The little clock ticked fussily on the +mantelpiece. Out in the street automobile horns were blowing. From +somewhere in the distance came faintly the rumble of an elevated train. +Familiar sounds, but they came to Sally now with a curious, unreal sense +of novelty. She felt as though she had been projected into another world +where everything was new and strange and horrible--everything except +Ginger. About him, in the mere sight of him, there was something known +and heartening. + +Suddenly, she became aware that she was feeling that Ginger was behaving +extremely well. She seemed to have been taken out of herself and to be +regarding the scene from outside, regarding it coolly and critically; +and it was plain to her that Ginger, in this upheaval of all things, was +bearing himself perfectly. He had attempted no banal words of sympathy. +He had said nothing and he was not looking at her. And Sally felt that +sympathy just now would be torture, and that she could not have borne to +be looked at. + +Ginger was wonderful. In that curious, detached spirit that had come +upon her, she examined him impartially, and gratitude welled up from the +very depths of her. There he sat, saying nothing and doing nothing, as +if he knew that all she needed, the only thing that could keep her sane +in this world of nightmare, was the sight of that dear, flaming head +of his that made her feel that the world had not slipped away from her +altogether. + +Ginger did not move. The room had grown almost dark now. A spear of +light from a street lamp shone in through the window. + +Sally got up abruptly. Slowly, gradually, inch by inch, the great +suffocating cloud which had been crushing her had lifted. She felt alive +again. Her black hour had gone, and she was back in the world of +living things once more. She was afire with a fierce, tearing pain that +tormented her almost beyond endurance, but dimly she sensed the fact +that she had passed through something that was worse than pain, and, +with Ginger's stolid presence to aid her, had passed triumphantly. + +"Go and have dinner, Ginger," she said. "You must be starving." + +Ginger came to life like a courtier in the palace of the Sleeping +Beauty. He shook himself, and rose stiffly from his chair. + +"Oh, no," he said. "Not a bit, really." + +Sally switched on the light and set him blinking. She could bear to be +looked at now. + +"Go and dine," she said. "Dine lavishly and luxuriously. You've +certainly earned..." Her voice faltered for a moment. She held out her +hand. "Ginger," she said shakily, "I... Ginger, you're a pal." + +When he had gone. Sally sat down and began to cry. Then she dried her +eyes in a business-like manner. + +"There, Miss Nicholas!" she said. "You couldn't have done that an hour +ago... We will now boil you an egg for your dinner and see how that +suits you!" + + + + +CHAPTER XI. SALLY RUNS AWAY + + + +If Ginger Kemp had been asked to enumerate his good qualities, it is not +probable that he would have drawn up a very lengthy list. He might have +started by claiming for himself the virtue of meaning well, but after +that he would have had to chew the pencil in prolonged meditation. And, +even if he could eventually have added one or two further items to the +catalogue, tact and delicacy of feeling would not have been among them. + +Yet, by staying away from Sally during the next few days he showed +considerable delicacy. It was not easy to stay away from her, but he +forced himself to do so. He argued from his own tastes, and was strongly +of opinion that in times of travail, solitude was what the sufferer most +desired. In his time he, too, had had what he would have described as +nasty jars, and on these occasions all he had asked was to be allowed to +sit and think things over and fight his battle out by himself. + +By Saturday, however, he had come to the conclusion that some form of +action might now be taken. Saturday was rather a good day for picking up +the threads again. He had not to go to the office, and, what was still +more to the point, he had just drawn his week's salary. Mrs. Meecher had +deftly taken a certain amount of this off him, but enough remained to +enable him to attempt consolation on a fairly princely scale. There +presented itself to him as a judicious move the idea of hiring a car and +taking Sally out to dinner at one of the road-houses he had heard about +up the Boston Post Road. He examined the scheme. The more he looked at +it, the better it seemed. + +He was helped to this decision by the extraordinary perfection of the +weather. The weather of late had been a revelation to Ginger. It was his +first experience of America's Indian Summer, and it had quite overcome +him. As he stood on the roof of Mrs. Meecher's establishment on the +Saturday morning, thrilled by the velvet wonder of the sunshine, it +seemed to him that the only possible way of passing such a day was to +take Sally for a ride in an open car. + +The Maison Meecher was a lofty building on one of the side-streets at +the lower end of the avenue. From its roof, after you had worked +your way through the groves of washing which hung limply from the +clothes-line, you could see many things of interest. To the left +lay Washington Square, full of somnolent Italians and roller-skating +children; to the right was a spectacle which never failed to intrigue +Ginger, the high smoke-stacks of a Cunard liner moving slowly down the +river, sticking up over the house-tops as if the boat was travelling +down Ninth Avenue. + +To-day there were four of these funnels, causing Ginger to deduce the +Mauritania. As the boat on which he had come over from England, the +Mauritania had a sentimental interest for him. He stood watching her +stately progress till the higher buildings farther down the town shut +her from his sight; then picked his way through the washing and went +down to his room to get his hat. A quarter of an hour later he was +in the hall-way of Sally's apartment house, gazing with ill-concealed +disgust at the serge-clad back of his cousin Mr. Carmyle, who was +engaged in conversation with a gentleman in overalls. + +No care-free prospector, singing his way through the Mojave Desert +and suddenly finding himself confronted by a rattlesnake, could have +experienced so abrupt a change of mood as did Ginger at this revolting +spectacle. Even in their native Piccadilly it had been unpleasant to run +into Mr. Carmyle. To find him here now was nothing short of nauseating. +Only one thing could have brought him to this place. Obviously, he must +have come to see Sally; and with a sudden sinking of the heart Ginger +remembered the shiny, expensive automobile which he had seen waiting at +the door. He, it was clear, was not the only person to whom the idea had +occurred of taking Sally for a drive on this golden day. + +He was still standing there when Mr. Carmyle swung round with a frown +on his dark face which seemed to say that he had not found the janitor's +conversation entertaining. The sight of Ginger plainly did nothing to +lighten his gloom. + +"Hullo!" he said. + +"Hullo!" said Ginger. + +Uncomfortable silence followed these civilities. + +"Have you come to see Miss Nicholas?" + +"Why, yes." + +"She isn't here," said Mr. Carmyle, and the fact that he had found +someone to share the bad news, seemed to cheer him a little. + +"Not here?" + +"No. Apparently..." Bruce Carmyle's scowl betrayed that resentment which +a well-balanced man cannot but feel at the unreasonableness of others. +"... Apparently, for some extraordinary reason, she has taken it into +her head to dash over to England." + +Ginger tottered. The unexpectedness of the blow was crushing. He +followed his cousin out into the sunshine in a sort of dream. Bruce +Carmyle was addressing the driver of the expensive automobile. + +"I find I shall not want the car. You can take it back to the garage." + +The chauffeur, a moody man, opened one half-closed eye and spat +cautiously. It was the way Rockefeller would have spat when approaching +the crisis of some delicate financial negotiation. + +"You'll have to pay just the same," he observed, opening his other eye +to lend emphasis to the words. + +"Of course I shall pay," snapped Mr. Carmyle, irritably. "How much is +it?" + +Money passed. The car rolled off. + +"Gone to England?" said Ginger, dizzily. + +"Yes, gone to England." + +"But why?" + +"How the devil do I know why?" Bruce Carmyle would have found his best +friend trying at this moment. Gaping Ginger gave him almost a physical +pain. "All I know is what the janitor told me, that she sailed on the +Mauretania this morning." + +The tragic irony of this overcame Ginger. That he should have stood on +the roof, calmly watching the boat down the river... + +He nodded absently to Mr. Carmyle and walked off. He had no further +remarks to make. The warmth had gone out of the sunshine and all +interest had departed from his life. He felt dull, listless, at a loose +end. Not even the thought that his cousin, a careful man with his money, +had had to pay a day's hire for a car which he could not use brought him +any balm. He loafed aimlessly about the streets. He wandered in the Park +and out again. The Park bored him. The streets bored him. The whole +city bored him. A city without Sally in it was a drab, futile city, and +nothing that the sun could do to brighten it could make it otherwise. + +Night came at last, and with it a letter. It was the first even passably +pleasant thing that had happened to Ginger in the whole of this dreary +and unprofitable day: for the envelope bore the crest of the good ship +Mauretania. He snatched it covetously from the letter-rack, and carried +it upstairs to his room. + +Very few of the rooms at Mrs. Meecher's boarding-house struck any +note of luxury. Mrs. Meecher was not one of your fashionable interior +decorators. She considered that when she had added a Morris chair to the +essentials which make up a bedroom, she had gone as far in the direction +of pomp as any guest at seven-and-a-half per could expect her to go. As +a rule, the severity of his surroundings afflicted Ginger with a touch +of gloom when he went to bed; but to-night--such is the magic of a +letter from the right person--he was uplifted and almost gay. There are +moments when even illuminated texts over the wash-stand cannot wholly +quell us. + +There was nothing of haste and much of ceremony in Ginger's method of +approaching the perusal of his correspondence. He bore himself after the +manner of a small boy in the presence of unexpected ice-cream, gloating +for awhile before embarking on the treat, anxious to make it last out. +His first move was to feel in the breast-pocket of his coat and produce +the photograph of Sally which he had feloniously removed from her +apartment. At this he looked long and earnestly before propping it +up within easy reach against his basin, to be handy, if required, for +purposes of reference. He then took off his coat, collar, and shoes, +filled and lit a pipe, placed pouch and matches on the arm of the Morris +chair, and drew that chair up so that he could sit with his feet on the +bed. Having manoeuvred himself into a position of ease, he lit his pipe +again and took up the letter. He looked at the crest, the handwriting of +the address, and the postmark. He weighed it in his hand. It was a bulky +letter. + +He took Sally's photograph from the wash-stand and scrutinized it once +more. Then he lit his pipe again, and, finally, wriggling himself into +the depths of the chair, opened the envelope. + +"Ginger, dear." + +Having read so far, Ginger found it necessary to take up the photograph +and study it with an even greater intentness than before. He gazed at it +for many minutes, then laid it down and lit his pipe again. Then he went +on with the letter. + +"Ginger, dear--I'm afraid this address is going to give you rather a +shock, and I'm feeling very guilty. I'm running away, and I haven't even +stopped to say good-bye. I can't help it. I know it's weak and cowardly, +but I simply can't help it. I stood it for a day or two, and then I +saw that it was no good. (Thank you for leaving me alone and not coming +round to see me. Nobody else but you would have done that. But then, +nobody ever has been or ever could be so understanding as you.)" + +Ginger found himself compelled at this point to look at the photograph +again. + +"There was too much in New York to remind me. That's the worst of being +happy in a place. When things go wrong you find there are too many +ghosts about. I just couldn't stand it. I tried, but I couldn't. I'm +going away to get cured--if I can. Mr. Faucitt is over in England, and +when I went down to Mrs. Meecher for my letters, I found one from him. +His brother is dead, you know, and he has inherited, of all things, +a fashionable dress-making place in Regent Street. His brother was +Laurette et Cie. I suppose he will sell the business later on, but, just +at present, the poor old dear is apparently quite bewildered and that +doesn't seem to have occurred to him. He kept saying in his letter how +much he wished I was with him, to help him, and I was tempted and ran. +Anything to get away from the ghosts and have something to do. I don't +suppose I shall feel much better in England, but, at least, every street +corner won't have associations. Don't ever be happy anywhere, Ginger. +It's too big a risk, much too big a risk. + +"There was a letter from Elsa Doland, too. Bubbling over with affection. +We had always been tremendous friends. Of course, she never knew +anything about my being engaged to Gerald. I lent Fillmore the money to +buy that piece, which gave Elsa her first big chance, and so she's very +grateful. She says, if ever she gets the opportunity of doing me a good +turn... Aren't things muddled? + +"And there was a letter from Gerald. I was expecting one, of course, +but... what would you have done, Ginger? Would you have read it? I sat +with it in front of me for an hour, I should think, just looking at the +envelope, and then... You see, what was the use? I could guess exactly +the sort of thing that would be in it, and reading it would only have +hurt a lot more. The thing was done, so why bother about explanations? +What good are explanations, anyway? They don't help. They don't do +anything... I burned it, Ginger. The last letter I shall ever get from +him. I made a bonfire on the bathroom floor, and it smouldered and went +brown, and then flared a little, and every now and then I lit another +match and kept it burning, and at last it was just black ashes and a +stain on the tiles. Just a mess! + +"Ginger, burn this letter, too. I'm pouring out all the poison to you, +hoping it will make me feel better. You don't mind, do you? But I know +you don't. If ever anybody had a real pal... + +"It's a dreadful thing, fascination, Ginger. It grips you and you are +helpless. One can be so sensible and reasonable about other people's +love affairs. When I was working at the dance place I told you about +there was a girl who fell in love with the most awful little beast. He +had a mean mouth and shiny black hair brushed straight back, and anybody +would have seen what he was. But this girl wouldn't listen to a word. +I talked to her by the hour. It makes me smile now when I think how +sensible and level-headed I was. But she wouldn't listen. In some +mysterious way this was the man she wanted, and, of course, everything +happened that one knew would happen. + +"If one could manage one's own life as well as one can manage other +people's! If all this wretched thing of mine had happened to some other +girl, how beautifully I could have proved that it was the best thing +that could have happened, and that a man who could behave as Gerald has +done wasn't worth worrying about. I can just hear myself. But, you see, +whatever he has done, Gerald is still Gerald and Sally is still Sally +and, however much I argue, I can't get away from that. All I can do is +to come howling to my redheaded pal, when I know just as well as he does +that a girl of any spirit would be dignified and keep her troubles to +herself and be much too proud to let anyone know that she was hurt. + +"Proud! That's the real trouble, Ginger. My pride has been battered and +chopped up and broken into as many pieces as you broke Mr. Scrymgeour's +stick! What pitiful creatures we are. Girls, I mean. At least, I suppose +a good many girls are like me. If Gerald had died and I had lost him +that way, I know quite well I shouldn't be feeling as I do now. I should +have been broken-hearted, but it wouldn't have been the same. It's +my pride that is hurt. I have always been a bossy, cocksure little +creature, swaggering about the world like an English sparrow; and now +I'm paying for it! Oh, Ginger, I'm paying for it! I wonder if running +away is going to do me any good at all. Perhaps, if Mr. Faucitt has some +real hard work for me to do... + +"Of course, I know exactly how all this has come about. Elsa's pretty +and attractive. But the point is that she is a success, and as a success +she appeals to Gerald's weakest side. He worships success. She is going +to have a marvellous career, and she can help Gerald on in his. He can +write plays for her to star in. What have I to offer against that? Yes, +I know it's grovelling and contemptible of me to say that, Ginger. I +ought to be above it, oughtn't I--talking as if I were competing for +some prize... But I haven't any pride left. Oh, well! + +"There! I've poured it all out and I really do feel a little better +just for the moment. It won't last, of course, but even a minute is +something. Ginger, dear, I shan't see you for ever so long, even if we +ever do meet again, but you'll try to remember that I'm thinking of +you a whole lot, won't you? I feel responsible for you. You're my baby. +You've got started now and you've only to stick to it. Please, please, +please don't 'make a hash of it'! Good-bye. I never did find that +photograph of me that we were looking for that afternoon in the +apartment, or I would send it to you. Then you could have kept it on +your mantelpiece, and whenever you felt inclined to make a hash of +anything I would have caught your eye sternly and you would have pulled +up. + +"Good-bye, Ginger. I shall have to stop now. The mail is just closing. + +"Always your pal, wherever I am.---SALLY." + +Ginger laid the letter down, and a little sound escaped him that was +half a sigh, half an oath. He was wondering whether even now some +desirable end might not be achieved by going to Chicago and breaking +Gerald Foster's neck. Abandoning this scheme as impracticable, and +not being able to think of anything else to do he re-lit his pipe and +started to read the letter again. + + + + +CHAPTER XII. SOME LETTERS FOR GINGER + + + +Laurette et Cie, + +Regent Street, + +London, W., + +England. + + + +January 21st. + +Dear Ginger,--I'm feeling better. As it's three months since I last +wrote to you, no doubt you will say to yourself that I would be a poor, +weak-minded creature if I wasn't. I suppose one ought to be able to get +over anything in three months. Unfortunately, I'm afraid I haven't quite +succeeded in doing that, but at least I have managed to get my troubles +stowed away in the cellar, and I'm not dragging them out and looking at +them all the time. That's something, isn't it? + +I ought to give you all my impressions of London, I suppose; but I've +grown so used to the place that I don't think I have any now. I seem to +have been here years and years. + +You will see by the address that Mr. Faucitt has not yet sold his +inheritance. He expects to do so very soon, he tells me--there is a +rich-looking man with whiskers and a keen eye whom he is always lunching +with, and I think big deals are in progress. Poor dear! he is crazy to +get away into the country and settle down and grow ducks and things. +London has disappointed him. It is not the place it used to be. Until +quite lately, when he grew resigned, he used to wander about in a +disconsolate sort of way, trying to locate the landmarks of his youth. +(He has not been in England for nearly thirty years!) The trouble is, it +seems, that about once in every thirty years a sort of craze for change +comes over London, and they paint a shop-front red instead of blue, and +that upsets the returned exile dreadfully. Mr. Faucitt feels like Rip +Van Winkle. His first shock was when he found that the Empire was a +theatre now instead of a music-hall. Then he was told that another +music-hall, the Tivoli, had been pulled down altogether. And when on top +of that he went to look at the baker's shop in Rupert Street, over which +he had lodgings in the eighties, and discovered that it had been turned +into a dressmaker's, he grew very melancholy, and only cheered up a +little when a lovely magenta fog came on and showed him that some things +were still going along as in the good old days. + +I am kept quite busy at Laurette et Cie., thank goodness. (Not being a +French scholar like you--do you remember Jules?--I thought at first that +Cie was the name of the junior partner, and looked forward to meeting +him. "Miss Nicholas, shake hands with Mr. Cie, one of your greatest +admirers.") I hold down the female equivalent of your job at the +Fillmore Nicholas Theatrical Enterprises Ltd.--that is to say, I'm a +sort of right-hand woman. I hang around and sidle up to the customers +when they come in, and say, "Chawming weather, moddom!" (which is +usually a black lie) and pass them on to the staff, who do the actual +work. I shouldn't mind going on like this for the next few years, but +Mr. Faucitt is determined to sell. I don't know if you are like that, +but every other Englishman I've ever met seems to have an ambition to +own a house and lot in Loamshire or Hants or Salop or somewhere. +Their one object in life is to make some money and "buy back the old +place"--which was sold, of course, at the end of act one to pay the +heir's gambling debts. + +Mr. Faucitt, when he was a small boy, used to live in a little village +in Gloucestershire, near a place called Cirencester--at least, it isn't: +it's called Cissister, which I bet you didn't know--and after forgetting +about it for fifty years, he has suddenly been bitten by the desire to +end his days there, surrounded by pigs and chickens. He took me down to +see the place the other day. Oh, Ginger, this English country! Why any +of you ever live in towns I can't think. Old, old grey stone houses with +yellow haystacks and lovely squelchy muddy lanes and great fat trees and +blue hills in the distance. The peace of it! If ever I sell my soul, I +shall insist on the devil giving me at least forty years in some English +country place in exchange. + +Perhaps you will think from all this that I am too much occupied to +remember your existence. Just to show how interested I am in you, let +me tell you that, when I was reading the paper a week ago, I happened to +see the headline, "International Match." It didn't seem to mean anything +at first, and then I suddenly recollected. This was the thing you had +once been a snip for! So I went down to a place called Twickenham, where +this football game was to be, to see the sort of thing you used to do +before I took charge of you and made you a respectable right-hand man. +There was an enormous crowd there, and I was nearly squeezed to death, +but I bore it for your sake. I found out that the English team were the +ones wearing white shirts, and that the ones in red were the Welsh. I +said to the man next to me, after he had finished yelling himself +black in the face, "Could you kindly inform me which is the English +scrum-half?" And just at that moment the players came quite near where +I was, and about a dozen assassins in red hurled themselves violently +on top of a meek-looking little fellow who had just fallen on the ball. +Ginger, you are well out of it! That was the scrum-half, and I gathered +that that sort of thing was a mere commonplace in his existence. +Stopping a rush, it is called, and he is expected to do it all the time. +The idea of you ever going in for such brutal sports! You thank your +stars that you are safe on your little stool in Fillmore's outer office, +and that, if anybody jumps on top of you now, you can call a cop. Do you +mean to say you really used to do these daredevil feats? You must have +hidden depths in you which I have never suspected. + +As I was taking a ride down Piccadilly the other day on top of a bus, I +saw somebody walking along who seemed familiar. It was Mr. Carmyle. So +he's back in England again. He didn't see me, thank goodness. I don't +want to meet anybody just at present who reminds me of New York. + +Thanks for telling me all the news, but please don't do it again. It +makes me remember, and I don't want to. It's this way, Ginger. Let me +write to you, because it really does relieve me, but don't answer my +letters. Do you mind? I'm sure you'll understand. + +So Fillmore and Gladys Winch are married! From what I have seen of +her, it's the best thing that has ever happened to Brother F. She is a +splendid girl. I must write to him... + + + +Laurette et Cie.. + +London + + + +March 12th. + +Dear Ginger,--I saw in a Sunday paper last week that "The Primrose Way" +had been produced in New York, and was a great success. Well, I'm very +glad. But I don't think the papers ought to print things like that. It's +unsettling. + +Next day, I did one of those funny things you do when you're feeling +blue and lonely and a long way away from everybody. I called at your +club and asked for you! Such a nice old man in uniform at the desk said +in a fatherly way that you hadn't been in lately, and he rather fancied +you were out of town, but would I take a seat while he inquired. He +then summoned a tiny boy, also in uniform, and the child skipped off +chanting, "Mister Kemp! Mister Kemp!" in a shrill treble. It gave me +such an odd feeling to hear your name echoing in the distance. I felt so +ashamed for giving them all that trouble; and when the boy came back +I slipped twopence into his palm, which I suppose was against all the +rules, though he seemed to like it. + +Mr. Faucitt has sold the business and retired to the country, and I am +rather at a loose end... + + + + Monk's Crofton, + (whatever that means) + Much Middleford, + Salop, + (slang for Shropshire) + England. + + + +April 18th. + +Dear Ginger,--What's the use? What is the use? I do all I can to get +right away from New York, and New York comes after me and tracks me down +in my hiding-place. A week or so ago, as I was walking down the Strand +in an aimless sort of way, out there came right on top of me--who do you +think? Fillmore, arm in arm with Mr. Carmyle! I couldn't dodge. In the +first place, Mr. Carmyle had seen me; in the second place, it is a day's +journey to dodge poor dear Fillmore now. I blushed for him. Ginger! +Right there in the Strand I blushed for him. In my worst dreams I had +never pictured him so enormous. Upon what meat doth this our Fillmore +feed that he is grown so great? Poor Gladys! When she looks at him she +must feel like a bigamist. + +Apparently Fillmore is still full of big schemes, for he talked airily +about buying all sorts of English plays. He has come over, as I suppose +you know, to arrange about putting on "The Primrose Way" over here. He +is staying at the Savoy, and they took me off there to lunch, whooping +joyfully as over a strayed lamb. It was the worst thing that could +possibly have happened to me. Fillmore talked Broadway without a pause, +till by the time he had worked his way past the French pastry and was +lolling back, breathing a little stertorously, waiting for the coffee +and liqueurs, he had got me so homesick that, if it hadn't been that I +didn't want to make a public exhibition of myself, I should have broken +down and howled. It was crazy of me ever to go near the Savoy. Of +course, it's simply an annex to Broadway. There were Americans at every +table as far as the eye could reach. I might just as well have been at +the Astor. + +Well, if Fate insists in bringing New York to England for my special +discomfiture, I suppose I have got to put up with it. I just let events +take their course, and I have been drifting ever since. Two days ago +I drifted here. Mr. Carmyle invited Fillmore--he seems to love +Fillmore--and me to Monk's Crofton, and I hadn't even the shadow of an +excuse for refusing. So I came, and I am now sitting writing to you in +an enormous bedroom with an open fire and armchairs and every other sort +of luxury. Fillmore is out golfing. He sails for New York on Saturday on +the Mauretania. I am horrified to hear from him that, in addition to all +his other big schemes, he is now promoting a fight for the light-weight +championship in Jersey City, and guaranteeing enormous sums to both +boxers. It's no good arguing with him. If you do, he simply quotes +figures to show the fortunes other people have made out of these things. +Besides, it's too late now, anyway. As far as I can make out, the fight +is going to take place in another week or two. All the same, it makes my +flesh creep. + +Well, it's no use worrying, I suppose. Let's change the subject. Do you +know Monk's Crofton? Probably you don't, as I seem to remember hearing +something said about it being a recent purchase. Mr. Carmyle bought it +from some lord or other who had been losing money on the Stock Exchange. +I hope you haven't seen it, anyway, because I want to describe it at +great length. I want to pour out my soul about it. Ginger, what has +England ever done to deserve such paradises? I thought, in my ignorance, +that Mr. Faucitt's Cissister place was pretty good, but it doesn't even +begin. It can't compete. Of course, his is just an ordinary country +house, and this is a Seat. Monk's Crofton is the sort of place they used +to write about in the English novels. You know. "The sunset was falling +on the walls of G---- Castle, in B----shire, hard by the picturesque +village of H----, and not a stone's throw from the hamlet of J----." I +can imagine Tennyson's Maud living here. It is one of the stately homes +of England; how beautiful they stand, and I'm crazy about it. + +You motor up from the station, and after you have gone about three +miles, you turn in at a big iron gate with stone posts on each side with +stone beasts on them. Close by the gate is the cutest little house with +an old man inside it who pops out and touches his hat. This is only the +lodge, really, but you think you have arrived; so you get all ready to +jump out, and then the car goes rolling on for another fifty miles or so +through beech woods full of rabbits and open meadows with deer in them. +Finally, just as you think you are going on for ever, you whizz round a +corner, and there's the house. You don't get a glimpse of it till then, +because the trees are too thick. + +It's very large, and sort of low and square, with a kind of tower at +one side and the most fascinating upper porch sort of thing with +battlements. I suppose in the old days you used to stand on this and +drop molten lead on visitors' heads. Wonderful lawns all round, and +shrubberies and a lake that you can just see where the ground dips +beyond the fields. Of course it's too early yet for them to be out, but +to the left of the house there's a place where there will be about +a million roses when June comes round, and all along the side of the +rose-garden is a high wall of old red brick which shuts off the kitchen +garden. I went exploring there this morning. It's an enormous place, +with hot-houses and things, and there's the cunningest farm at one end +with a stable yard full of puppies that just tear the heart out of you, +they're so sweet. And a big, sleepy cat, which sits and blinks in +the sun and lets the puppies run all over her. And there's a lovely +stillness, and you can hear everything growing. And thrushes and +blackbirds... Oh, Ginger, it's heavenly! + +But there's a catch. It's a case of "Where every prospect pleases and +only man is vile." At least, not exactly vile, I suppose, but terribly +stodgy. I can see now why you couldn't hit it off with the Family. +Because I've seen 'em all! They're here! Yes, Uncle Donald and all of +them. Is it a habit of your family to collect in gangs, or have I just +happened to stumble into an accidental Old Home Week? When I came down +to dinner the first evening, the drawing-room was full to bursting +point--not simply because Fillmore was there, but because there were +uncles and aunts all over the place. I felt like a small lion in a den +of Daniels. I know exactly now what you mean about the Family. They look +at you! Of course, it's all right for me, because I am snowy white clear +through, but I can just imagine what it must have been like for you with +your permanently guilty conscience. You must have had an awful time. + +By the way, it's going to be a delicate business getting this letter +through to you--rather like carrying the despatches through the enemy's +lines in a Civil War play. You're supposed to leave letters on the table +in the hall, and someone collects them in the afternoon and takes them +down to the village on a bicycle. But, if I do that some aunt or uncle +is bound to see it, and I shall be an object of loathing, for it is no +light matter, my lad, to be caught having correspondence with a human +Jimpson weed like you. It would blast me socially. At least, so I gather +from the way they behaved when your name came up at dinner last night. +Somebody mentioned you, and the most awful roasting party broke loose. +Uncle Donald acting as cheer-leader. I said feebly that I had met you +and had found you part human, and there was an awful silence till they +all started at the same time to show me where I was wrong, and how +cruelly my girlish inexperience had deceived me. A young and innocent +half-portion like me, it appears, is absolutely incapable of suspecting +the true infamy of the dregs of society. You aren't fit to speak to the +likes of me, being at the kindest estimate little more than a blot on +the human race. I tell you this in case you may imagine you're popular +with the Family. You're not. + +So I shall have to exercise a good deal of snaky craft in smuggling this +letter through. I'll take it down to the village myself if I can sneak +away. But it's going to be pretty difficult, because for some reason I +seem to be a centre of attraction. Except when I take refuge in my +room, hardly a moment passes without an aunt or an uncle popping out +and having a cosy talk with me. It sometimes seems as though they were +weighing me in the balance. Well, let 'em weigh! + +Time to dress for dinner now. Good-bye. + +Yours in the balance, + +Sally. + +P.S.--You were perfectly right about your Uncle Donald's moustache, but +I don't agree with you that it is more his misfortune than his fault. I +think he does it on purpose. + + + + (Just for the moment) + Monk's Crofton, + Much Middleford, + Salop, + England. + + + +April 20th. + +Dear Ginger,--Leaving here to-day. In disgrace. Hard, cold looks from +the family. Strained silences. Uncle Donald far from chummy. You can +guess what has happened. I might have seen it coming. I can see now that +it was in the air all along. + +Fillmore knows nothing about it. He left just before it happened. +I shall see him very soon, for I have decided to come back and stop +running away from things any longer. It's cowardly to skulk about over +here. Besides, I'm feeling so much better that I believe I can face +the ghosts. Anyway, I'm going to try. See you almost as soon as you get +this. + +I shall mail this in London, and I suppose it will come over by the same +boat as me. It's hardly worth writing, really, of course, but I have +sneaked up to my room to wait till the motor arrives to take me to the +station, and it's something to do. I can hear muffled voices. The Family +talking me over, probably. Saying they never really liked me all along. +Oh, well! + +Yours moving in an orderly manner to the exit, + +Sally. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. STRANGE BEHAVIOUR OF A SPARRING-PARTNER + + + +1 + + + +Sally's emotions, as she sat in her apartment on the morning of her +return to New York, resembled somewhat those of a swimmer who, after +wavering on a raw morning at the brink of a chill pool, nerves himself +to the plunge. She was aching, but she knew that she had done well. If +she wanted happiness, she must fight for it, and for all these months +she had been shirking the fight. She had done with wavering on the +brink, and here she was, in mid-stream, ready for whatever might befall. +It hurt, this coming to grips. She had expected it to hurt. But it was +a pain that stimulated, not a dull melancholy that smothered. She felt +alive and defiant. + +She had finished unpacking and tidying up. The next move was certainly +to go and see Ginger. She had suddenly become aware that she wanted very +badly to see Ginger. His stolid friendliness would be a support and a +prop. She wished now that she had sent him a cable, so that he could +have met her at the dock. It had been rather terrible at the dock. +The echoing customs sheds had sapped her valour and she felt alone and +forlorn. + +She looked at her watch, and was surprised to find how early it was. She +could catch him at the office and make him take her out to lunch. She +put on her hat and went out. + +The restless hand of change, always active in New York, had not spared +the outer office of the Fillmore Nicholas Theatrical Enterprises Ltd. in +the months of her absence. She was greeted on her arrival by an entirely +new and original stripling in the place of the one with whom at her last +visit she had established such cordial relations. Like his predecessor +he was generously pimpled, but there the resemblance stopped. He was a +grim boy, and his manner was stern and suspicious. He peered narrowly at +Sally for a moment as if he had caught her in the act of purloining the +office blotting-paper, then, with no little acerbity, desired her to +state her business. + +"I want Mr. Kemp," said Sally. + +The office-boy scratched his cheek dourly with a ruler. No one would +have guessed, so austere was his aspect, that a moment before her +entrance he had been trying to balance it on his chin, juggling the +while with a pair of paper-weights. For, impervious as he seemed +to human weaknesses, it was this lad's ambition one day to go into +vaudeville. + +"What name?" he said, coldly. + +"Nicholas," said Sally. "I am Mr. Nicholas' sister." + +On a previous occasion when she had made this announcement, disastrous +results had ensued; but to-day it went well. It seemed to hit the +office-boy like a bullet. He started convulsively, opened his mouth, and +dropped the ruler. In the interval of stooping and recovering it he was +able to pull himself together. He had not been curious about Sally's +name. What he had wished was to have the name of the person for whom she +was asking repeated. He now perceived that he had had a bit of luck. +A wearying period of disappointment in the matter of keeping the +paper-weights circulating while balancing the ruler, had left him +peevish, and it had been his intention to work off his ill-humour on +the young visitor. The discovery that it was the boss's sister who was +taking up his time, suggested the advisability of a radical change of +tactics. He had stooped with a frown: he returned to the perpendicular +with a smile that was positively winning. It was like the sun suddenly +bursting through a London fog. + +"Will you take a seat, lady?" he said, with polished courtesy even +unbending so far as to reach out and dust one with the sleeve of his +coat. He added that the morning was a fine one. + +"Thank you," said Sally. "Will you tell him I'm here." + +"Mr. Nicholas is out, miss," said the office-boy, with gentlemanly +regret. "He's back in New York, but he's gone out." + +"I don't want Mr. Nicholas. I want Mr. Kemp." + +"Mr. Kemp?" + +"Yes, Mr. Kemp." + +Sorrow at his inability to oblige shone from every hill-top on the boy's +face. + +"Don't know of anyone of that name around here," he said, +apologetically. + +"But surely..." Sally broke off suddenly. A grim foreboding had come to +her. "How long have you been here?" she asked. + +"All day, ma'am," said the office-boy, with the manner of a Casablanca. + +"I mean, how long have you been employed here?" + +"Just over a month, miss." + +"Hasn't Mr. Kemp been in the office all that time?" + +"Name's new to me, lady. Does he look like anything? I meanter say, +what's he look like?" + +"He has very red hair." + +"Never seen him in here," said the office-boy. The truth shone coldly +on Sally. She blamed herself for ever having gone away, and told herself +that she might have known what would happen. Left to his own resources, +the unhappy Ginger had once more made a hash of it. And this hash must +have been a more notable and outstanding hash than any of his previous +efforts, for, surely, Fillmore would not lightly have dismissed one who +had come to him under her special protection. + +"Where is Mr. Nicholas?" she asked. It seemed to her that Fillmore was +the only possible source of information. "Did you say he was out?" + +"Really out, miss," said the office-boy, with engaging candour. "He went +off to White Plains in his automobile half-an-hour ago." + +"White Plains? What for?" + +The pimpled stripling had now given himself up wholeheartedly to +social chit-chat. Usually he liked his time to himself and resented the +intrusion of the outer world, for he who had chosen jugglery for +his walk in life must neglect no opportunity of practising: but so +favourable was the impression which Sally had made on his plastic mind +that he was delighted to converse with her as long as she wished. + +"I guess what's happened is, he's gone up to take a look at Bugs +Butler," he said. + +"Whose butler?" said Sally mystified. + +The office-boy smiled a tolerant smile. Though an admirer of the sex, he +was aware that women were seldom hep to the really important things in +life. He did not blame them. That was the way they were constructed, and +one simply had to accept it. + +"Bugs Butler is training up at White Plains, miss." + +"Who is Bugs Butler?" + +Something of his former bleakness of aspect returned to the office-boy. +Sally's question had opened up a subject on which he felt deeply. + +"Ah!" he replied, losing his air of respectful deference as he +approached the topic. "Who is he! That's what they're all saying, all +the wise guys. Who has Bugs Butler ever licked?" + +"I don't know," said Sally, for he had fixed her with a penetrating gaze +and seemed to be pausing for a reply. + +"Nor nobody else," said the stripling vehemently. "A lot of stiffs out +on the coast, that's all. Ginks nobody has ever heard of, except Cyclone +Mullins, and it took that false alarm fifteen rounds to get a referee's +decision over him. The boss would go and give him a chance against the +champ, but I could have told him that the legitimate contender was +K-leg Binns. K-leg put Cyclone Mullins out in the fifth. Well," said the +office-boy in the overwrought tone of one chafing at human folly, "if +anybody thinks Bugs Butler can last six rounds with Lew Lucas, I've two +bucks right here in my vest pocket that says it ain't so." + +Sally began to see daylight. + +"Oh, Bugs--Mr. Butler is one of the boxers in this fight that my brother +is interested in?" + +"That's right. He's going up against the lightweight champ. Lew Lucas is +the lightweight champ. He's a bird!" + +"Yes?" said Sally. This youth had a way of looking at her with his head +cocked on one side as though he expected her to say something. + +"Yes, sir!" said the stripling with emphasis. "Lew Lucas is a hot +sketch. He used to live on the next street to me," he added as clinching +evidence of his hero's prowess. "I've seen his old mother as close as +I am to you. Say, I seen her a hundred times. Is any stiff of a Bugs +Butler going to lick a fellow like that?" + +"It doesn't seem likely." + +"You spoke it!" said the lad crisply, striking unsuccessfully at a fly +which had settled on the blotting-paper. + +There was a pause. Sally started to rise. + +"And there's another thing," said the office-boy, loath to close the +subject. "Can Bugs Butler make a hundred and thirty-five ringside +without being weak?" + +"It sounds awfully difficult." + +"They say he's clever." The expert laughed satirically. "Well, +what's that going to get him? The poor fish can't punch a hole in a +nut-sundae." + +"You don't seem to like Mr. Butler." + +"Oh, I've nothing against him," said the office-boy magnanimously. "I'm +only saying he's no licence to be mixing it with Lew Lucas." + +Sally got up. Absorbing as this chat on current form was, more important +matters claimed her attention. + +"How shall I find my brother when I get to White Plains?" she asked. + +"Oh, anybody'll show you the way to the training-camp. If you hurry, +there's a train you can make now." + +"Thank you very much." + +"You're welcome." + +He opened the door for her with an old-world politeness which disuse had +rendered a little rusty: then, with an air of getting back to business +after a pleasant but frivolous interlude, he took up the paper-weights +once more and placed the ruler with nice care on his upturned chin. + + + +2 + + + +Fillmore heaved a sigh of relief and began to sidle from the room. It +was a large room, half barn, half gymnasium. Athletic appliances of +various kinds hung on the walls and in the middle there was a wide +roped-off space, around which a small crowd had distributed itself with +an air of expectancy. This is a commercial age, and the days when a +prominent pugilist's training activities used to be hidden from the +public gaze are over. To-day, if the public can lay its hands on fifty +cents, it may come and gaze its fill. This afternoon, plutocrats to the +number of about forty had assembled, though not all of these, to the +regret of Mr. Lester Burrowes, the manager of the eminent Bugs Butler, +had parted with solid coin. Many of those present were newspaper +representatives and on the free list--writers who would polish up Mr. +Butler's somewhat crude prognostications as to what he proposed to do +to Mr. Lew Lucas, and would report him as saying, "I am in really superb +condition and feel little apprehension of the issue," and artists who +would depict him in a state of semi-nudity with feet several sizes too +large for any man. + +The reason for Fillmore's relief was that Mr. Burrowes, who was a great +talker and had buttonholed him a quarter of an hour ago, had at last had +his attention distracted elsewhere, and had gone off to investigate some +matter that called for his personal handling, leaving Fillmore free to +slide away to the hotel and get a bite to eat, which he sorely needed. +The zeal which had brought him to the training-camp to inspect the final +day of Mr. Butler's preparation--for the fight was to take place on the +morrow--had been so great that he had omitted to lunch before leaving +New York. + +So Fillmore made thankfully for the door. And it was at the door that he +encountered Sally. He was looking over his shoulder at the moment, and +was not aware of her presence till she spoke. + +"Hallo, Fillmore!" + +Sally had spoken softly, but a dynamite explosion could not have +shattered her brother's composure with more completeness. In the leaping +twist which brought him facing her, he rose a clear three inches from +the floor. He had a confused sensation, as though his nervous system had +been stirred up with a pole. He struggled for breath and moistened his +lips with the tip of his tongue, staring at her continuously during the +process. + +Great men, in their moments of weakness, are to be pitied rather than +scorned. If ever a man had an excuse for leaping like a young ram, +Fillmore had it. He had left Sally not much more than a week ago in +England, in Shropshire, at Monk's Crofton. She had said nothing of any +intention on her part of leaving the country, the county, or the house. +Yet here she was, in Bugs Butler's training-camp at White Plains, in the +State of New York, speaking softly in his ear without even going +through the preliminary of tapping him on the shoulder to advertise her +presence. No wonder that Fillmore was startled. And no wonder that, as +he adjusted his faculties to the situation, there crept upon him a chill +apprehension. + +For Fillmore had not been blind to the significance of that invitation +to Monk's Crofton. Nowadays your wooer does not formally approach a +girl's nearest relative and ask permission to pay his addresses; but, +when he invites her and that nearest relative to his country home and +collects all the rest of the family to meet her, the thing may be +said to have advanced beyond the realms of mere speculation. Shrewdly +Fillmore had deduced that Bruce Carmyle was in love with Sally, and +mentally he had joined their hands and given them a brother's blessing. +And now it was only too plain that disaster must have occurred. If the +invitation could mean only one thing, so also could Sally's presence at +White Plains mean only one thing. + +"Sally!" A croaking whisper was the best he could achieve. "What... +what...?" + +"Did I startle you? I'm sorry." + +"What are you doing here? Why aren't you at Monk's Crofton?" + +Sally glanced past him at the ring and the crowd around it. + +"I decided I wanted to get back to America. Circumstances arose which +made it pleasanter to leave Monk's Crofton." + +"Do you mean to say...?" + +"Yes. Don't let's talk about it." + +"Do you mean to say," persisted Fillmore, "that Carmyle proposed to you +and you turned him down?" + +Sally flushed. + +"I don't think it's particularly nice to talk about that sort of thing, +but--yes." + +A feeling of desolation overcame Fillmore. That conviction, which +saddens us at all times, of the wilful bone-headedness of our fellows +swept coldly upon him. Everything had been so perfect, the whole +arrangement so ideal, that it had never occurred to him as a possibility +that Sally might take it into her head to spoil it by declining to play +the part allotted to her. The match was so obviously the best thing that +could happen. It was not merely the suitor's impressive wealth that made +him hold this opinion, though it would be idle to deny that the prospect +of having a brother-in-lawful claim on the Carmyle bank-balance had cast +a rosy glamour over the future as he had envisaged it. He honestly +liked and respected the man. He appreciated his quiet and aristocratic +reserve. A well-bred fellow, sensible withal, just the sort of husband +a girl like Sally needed. And now she had ruined everything. With the +capricious perversity which so characterizes her otherwise delightful +sex, she had spilled the beans. + +"But why?" + +"Oh, Fill!" Sally had expected that realization of the facts would +produce these symptoms in him, but now that they had presented +themselves she was finding them rasping to the nerves. "I should have +thought the reason was obvious." + +"You mean you don't like him?" + +"I don't know whether I do or not. I certainly don't like him enough to +marry him." + +"He's a darned good fellow." + +"Is he? You say so. I don't know." + +The imperious desire for bodily sustenance began to compete successfully +for Fillmore's notice with his spiritual anguish. + +"Let's go to the hotel and talk it over. We'll go to the hotel and I'll +give you something to eat." + +"I don't want anything to eat, thanks." + +"You don't want anything to eat?" said Fillmore incredulously. He +supposed in a vague sort of way that there were eccentric people of +this sort, but it was hard to realize that he had met one of them. "I'm +starving." + +"Well, run along then." + +"Yes, but I want to talk..." + +He was not the only person who wanted to talk. At the moment a small +man of sporting exterior hurried up. He wore what his tailor's +advertisements would have called a "nobbly" suit of checked tweed +and--in defiance of popular prejudice--a brown bowler hat. Mr. Lester +Burrowes, having dealt with the business which had interrupted their +conversation a few minutes before, was anxious to resume his remarks +on the subject of the supreme excellence in every respect of his young +charge. + +"Say, Mr. Nicholas, you ain't going'? Bugs is just getting ready to +spar." + +He glanced inquiringly at Sally. + +"My sister--Mr. Burrowes," said Fillmore faintly. "Mr. Burrowes is Bugs +Butler's manager." + +"How do you do?" said Sally. + +"Pleased to meecher," said Mr. Burrowes. "Say..." + +"I was just going to the hotel to get something to eat," said Fillmore. + +Mr. Burrowes clutched at his coat-button with a swoop, and held him with +a glittering eye. + +"Yes, but, say, before-you-go-lemme-tell-ya-somef'n. You've never seen +this boy of mine, not when he was feeling right. Believe me, he's there! +He's a wizard. He's a Hindoo! Say, he's been practising up a left shift +that..." + +Fillmore's eye met Sally's wanly, and she pitied him. Presently she +would require him to explain to her how he had dared to dismiss Ginger +from his employment--and make that explanation a good one: but in the +meantime she remembered that he was her brother and was suffering. + +"He's the cleverest lightweight," proceeded Mr. Burrowes fervently, +"since Joe Gans. I'm telling you and I know! He..." + +"Can he make a hundred and thirty-five ringside without being weak?" +asked Sally. + +The effect of this simple question on Mr. Burrowes was stupendous. He +dropped away from Fillmore's coat-button like an exhausted bivalve, +and his small mouth opened feebly. It was as if a child had suddenly +propounded to an eminent mathematician some abstruse problem in the +higher algebra. Females who took an interest in boxing had come into +Mr. Burrowes' life before---in his younger days, when he was a famous +featherweight, the first of his three wives had been accustomed to sit +at the ringside during his contests and urge him in language of the +severest technicality to knock opponents' blocks off--but somehow he had +not supposed from her appearance and manner that Sally was one of the +elect. He gaped at her, and the relieved Fillmore sidled off like a bird +hopping from the compelling gaze of a snake. He was not quite sure that +he was acting correctly in allowing his sister to roam at large among +the somewhat Bohemian surroundings of a training-camp, but the instinct +of self-preservation turned the scale. He had breakfasted early, and if +he did not eat right speedily it seemed to him that dissolution would +set in. + +"Whazzat?" said Mr. Burrowes feebly. + +"It took him fifteen rounds to get a referee's decision over Cyclone +Mullins," said Sally severely, "and K-leg Binns..." + +Mr. Burrowes rallies. + +"You ain't got it right" he protested. "Say, you mustn't believe what +you see in the papers. The referee was dead against us, and Cyclone was +down once for all of half a minute and they wouldn't count him out. Gee! +You got to kill a guy in some towns before they'll give you a decision. +At that, they couldn't do nothing so raw as make it anything but a win +for my boy, after him leading by a mile all the way. Have you ever seen +Bugs, ma'am?" + +Sally had to admit that she had not had that privilege. Mr. Burrowes +with growing excitement felt in his breast-pocket and produced a +picture-postcard, which he thrust into her hand. + +"That's Bugs," he said. "Take a slant at that and then tell me if he +don't look the goods." + +The photograph represented a young man in the irreducible minimum of +clothing who crouched painfully, as though stricken with one of the +acuter forms of gastritis. + +"I'll call him over and have him sign it for you," said Mr. Burrowes, +before Sally had had time to grasp the fact that this work of art was a +gift and no mere loan. "Here, Bugs--wantcher." + +A youth enveloped in a bath-robe, who had been talking to a group of +admirers near the ring, turned, started languidly towards them, then, +seeing Sally, quickened his pace. He was an admirer of the sex. + +Mr. Burrowes did the honours. + +"Bugs, this is Miss Nicholas, come to see you work out. I have been +telling her she's going to have a treat." And to Sally. "Shake hands +with Bugs Butler, ma'am, the coming lightweight champion of the world." + +Mr. Butler's photograph, Sally considered, had flattered him. He was, in +the flesh, a singularly repellent young man. There was a mean and cruel +curve to his lips and a cold arrogance in his eye; a something dangerous +and sinister in the atmosphere he radiated. Moreover, she did not like +the way he smirked at her. + +However, she exerted herself to be amiable. + +"I hope you are going to win, Mr. Butler," she said. + +The smile which she forced as she spoke the words removed the coming +champion's doubts, though they had never been serious. He was convinced +now that he had made a hit. He always did, he reflected, with the girls. +It was something about him. His chest swelled complacently beneath the +bath-robe. + +"You betcher," he asserted briefly. + +Mr. Burrows looked at his watch. + +"Time you were starting, Bugs." + +The coming champion removed his gaze from Sally's face, into which he +had been peering in a conquering manner, and cast a disparaging glance +at the audience. It was far from being as large as he could have +wished, and at least a third of it was composed of non-payers from the +newspapers. + +"All right," he said, bored. + +His languor left him, as his gaze fell on Sally again, and his spirits +revived somewhat. After all, small though the numbers of spectators +might be, bright eyes would watch and admire him. + +"I'll go a couple of rounds with Reddy for a starter," he said. "Seen +him anywheres? He's never around when he's wanted." + +"I'll fetch him," said Mr. Burrowes. "He's back there somewheres." + +"I'm going to show that guy up this afternoon," said Mr. Butler coldly. +"He's been getting too fresh." + +The manager bustled off, and Bugs Butler, with a final smirk, left Sally +and dived under the ropes. There was a stir of interest in the audience, +though the newspaper men, blasé through familiarity, exhibited no +emotion. Presently Mr. Burrowes reappeared, shepherding a young man +whose face was hidden by the sweater which he was pulling over his head. +He was a sturdily built young man. The sweater, moving from his body, +revealed a good pair of shoulders. + +A last tug, and the sweater was off. Red hair flashed into view, tousled +and disordered: and, as she saw it, Sally uttered an involuntary gasp +of astonishment which caused many eyes to turn towards her. And the +red-headed young man, who had been stooping to pick up his gloves, +straightened himself with a jerk and stood staring at her blankly and +incredulously, his face slowly crimsoning. + + + +3 + + + +It was the energetic Mr. Burrowes who broke the spell. + +"Come on, come on," he said impatiently. "Li'l speed there, Reddy." + +Ginger Kemp started like a sleep-walker awakened; then recovering +himself, slowly began to pull on the gloves. Embarrassment was stamped +on his agreeable features. His face matched his hair. + +Sally plucked at the little manager's elbow. He turned irritably, but +beamed in a distrait sort of manner when he perceived the source of the +interruption. + +"Who--him?" he said in answer to Sally's whispered question. "He's just +one of Bugs' sparring-partners." + +"But..." + +Mr. Burrowes, fussy now that the time had come for action, interrupted +her. + +"You'll excuse me, miss, but I have to hold the watch. We mustn't waste +any time." + +Sally drew back. She felt like an infidel who intrudes upon the +celebration of strange rites. This was Man's hour, and women must keep +in the background. She had the sensation of being very small and yet +very much in the way, like a puppy who has wandered into a church. The +novelty and solemnity of the scene awed her. + +She looked at Ginger, who with averted gaze was fiddling with his +clothes in the opposite corner of the ring. He was as removed from +communication as if he had been in another world. She continued to +stare, wide-eyed, and Ginger, shuffling his feet self-consciously, +plucked at his gloves. + +Mr. Butler, meanwhile, having doffed his bath-robe, stretched himself, +and with leisurely nonchalance put on a second pair of gloves, was +filling in the time with a little shadow boxing. He moved rhythmically +to and fro, now ducking his head, now striking out with his muffled +hands, and a sickening realization of the man's animal power swept over +Sally and turned her cold. Swathed in his bath-robe, Bugs Butler had +conveyed an atmosphere of dangerousness: in the boxing-tights which +showed up every rippling muscle, he was horrible and sinister, a machine +built for destruction, a human panther. + +So he appeared to Sally, but a stout and bulbous eyed man standing at +her side was not equally impressed. Obviously one of the Wise Guys +of whom her friend the sporting office-boy had spoken, he was frankly +dissatisfied with the exhibition. + +"Shadow-boxing," he observed in a cavilling spirit to his companion. +"Yes, he can do that all right, just like I can fox-trot if I ain't got +a partner to get in the way. But one good wallop, and then watch him." + +His friend, also plainly a guy of established wisdom, assented with a +curt nod. + +"Ah!" he agreed. + +"Lew Lucas," said the first wise guy, "is just as shifty, and he can +punch." + +"Ah!" said the second wise guy. + +"Just because he beats up a few poor mutts of sparring-partners," said +the first wise guy disparagingly, "he thinks he's someone." + +"Ah!" said the second wise guy. + +As far as Sally could interpret these remarks, the full meaning of which +was shrouded from her, they seemed to be reassuring. For a comforting +moment she ceased to regard Ginger as a martyr waiting to be devoured by +a lion. Mr. Butler, she gathered, was not so formidable as he appeared. +But her relief was not to be long-lived. + +"Of course he'll eat this red-headed gink," went on the first wise guy. +"That's the thing he does best, killing his sparring-partners. But Lew +Lucas..." + +Sally was not interested in Lew Lucas. That numbing fear had come back +to her. Even these cognoscenti, little as they esteemed Mr. Butler, had +plainly no doubts as to what he would do to Ginger. She tried to tear +herself away, but something stronger than her own will kept her there +standing where she was, holding on to the rope and staring forlornly +into the ring. + +"Ready, Bugs?" asked Mr. Burrowes. + +The coming champion nodded carelessly. + +"Go to it," said Mr. Burrowes. + +Ginger ceased to pluck at his gloves and advanced into the ring. + + + +4 + + + +Of all the learned professions, pugilism is the one in which the trained +expert is most sharply divided from the mere dabbler. In other fields +the amateur may occasionally hope to compete successfully with the man +who has made a business of what is to him but a sport, but at boxing +never: and the whole demeanour of Bugs Butler showed that he had laid +this truth to heart. It would be too little to say that his bearing +was confident: he comported himself with the care-free jauntiness of +an infant about to demolish a Noah's Ark with a tack-hammer. Cyclone +Mullinses might withstand him for fifteen rounds where they yielded to +a K-leg Binns in the fifth, but, when it came to beating up a +sparring-partner and an amateur at that, Bugs Butler knew his +potentialities. He was there forty ways and he did not attempt to +conceal it. Crouching as was his wont, he uncoiled himself like a +striking rattlesnake and flicked Ginger lightly over his guard. Then +he returned to his crouch and circled sinuously about the ring with the +amiable intention of showing the crowd, payers and deadheads alike, what +real footwork was. If there was one thing on which Bugs Butler prided +himself, it was footwork. + +The adverb "lightly" is a relative term, and the blow which had just +planted a dull patch on Ginger's cheekbone affected those present in +different degrees. Ginger himself appeared stolidly callous. Sally +shuddered to the core of her being and had to hold more tightly to the +rope to support herself. The two wise guys mocked openly. To the +wise guys, expert connoisseurs of swat, the thing had appeared richly +farcical. They seemed to consider the blow, administered to a third +party and not to themselves, hardly worth calling a blow at all. Two +more, landing as quickly and neatly as the first, left them equally +cold. + +"Call that punching?" said the first wise guy. + +"Ah!" said the second wise guy. + +But Mr. Butler, if he heard this criticism--and it is probable that he +did--for the wise ones had been restrained by no delicacy of feeling +from raising their voices, was in no way discommoded by it. Bugs Butler +knew what he was about. Bright eyes were watching him, and he meant to +give them a treat. The girls like smooth work. Any roughneck could sail +into a guy and knock the daylights out of him, but how few could be +clever and flashy and scientific? Few, few, indeed, thought Mr. Butler +as he slid in and led once more. + +Something solid smote Mr. Butler's nose, rocking him on to his heels and +inducing an unpleasant smarting sensation about his eyes. He backed +away and regarded Ginger with astonishment, almost with pain. Until this +moment he had scarcely considered him as an active participant in the +scene at all, and he felt strongly that this sort of thing was bad form. +It was not being done by sparring-partners. + +A juster man might have reflected that he himself was to blame. He had +undeniably been careless. In the very act of leading he had allowed his +eyes to flicker sideways to see how Sally was taking this exhibition of +science, and he had paid the penalty. Nevertheless, he was piqued. He +shimmered about the ring, thinking it over. And the more he thought it +over, the less did he approve of his young assistant's conduct. Hard +thoughts towards Ginger began to float in his mind. + +Ginger, too, was thinking hard thoughts. He had not had an easy time +since he had come to the training camp, but never till to-day had he +experienced any resentment towards his employer. Until this afternoon +Bugs Butler had pounded him honestly and without malice, and he had gone +through it, as the other sparring-partners did, phlegmatically, taking +it as part of the day's work. But this afternoon there had been a +difference. Those careless flicks had been an insult, a deliberate +offence. The man was trying to make a fool of him, playing to the +gallery: and the thought of who was in that gallery inflamed Ginger past +thought of consequences. No one, not even Mr. Butler, was more keenly +alive than he to the fact that in a serious conflict with a man who +to-morrow night might be light-weight champion of the world he stood no +chance whatever: but he did not intend to be made an exhibition of in +front of Sally without doing something to hold his end up. He proposed +to go down with his flag flying, and in pursuance of this object he dug +Mr. Butler heavily in the lower ribs with his right, causing that expert +to clinch and the two wise guys to utter sharp barking sounds expressive +of derision. + +"Say, what the hell d'ya think you're getting at?" demanded the +aggrieved pugilist in a heated whisper in Ginger's ear as they fell into +the embrace. "What's the idea, you jelly bean?" + +Ginger maintained a pink silence. His jaw was set, and the temper which +Nature had bestowed upon him to go with his hair had reached white +heat. He dodged a vicious right which whizzed up at his chin out of the +breaking clinch, and rushed. A left hook shook him, but was too high +to do more. There was rough work in the far corner, and suddenly with +startling abruptness Bugs Butler, bothered by the ropes at his back and +trying to side-step, ran into a swing and fell. + +"Time!" shouted the scandalized Mr. Burrowes, utterly aghast at +this frightful misadventure. In the whole course of his professional +experience he could recall no such devastating occurrence. + +The audience was no less startled. There was audible gasping. The +newspaper men looked at each other with a wild surmise and conjured up +pleasant pictures of their sporting editors receiving this sensational +item of news later on over the telephone. The two wise guys, continuing +to pursue Mr. Butler with their dislike, emitted loud and raucous +laughs, and one of them, forming his hands into a megaphone, urged the +fallen warrior to go away and get a rep. As for Sally, she was conscious +of a sudden, fierce, cave-womanly rush of happiness which swept away +completely the sickening qualms of the last few minutes. Her teeth +were clenched and her eyes blazed with joyous excitement. She looked +at Ginger yearningly, longing to forget a gentle upbringing and shout +congratulation to him. She was proud of him. And mingled with the pride +was a curious feeling that was almost fear. This was not the mild and +amiable young man whom she was wont to mother through the difficulties +of a world in which he was unfitted to struggle for himself. This was a +new Ginger, a stranger to her. + +On the rare occasions on which he had been knocked down in the past, +it had been Bugs Butler's canny practice to pause for a while and rest +before rising and continuing the argument, but now he was up almost +before he had touched the boards, and the satire of the second wise guy, +who had begun to saw the air with his hand and count loudly, lost its +point. It was only too plain that Mr. Butler's motto was that a man +may be down, but he is never out. And, indeed, the knock-down had been +largely a stumble. Bugs Butler's educated feet, which had carried him +unscathed through so many contests, had for this single occasion managed +to get themselves crossed just as Ginger's blow landed, and it was to +his lack of balance rather than the force of the swing that his downfall +had been due. + +"Time!" he snarled, casting a malevolent side-glance at his manager. +"Like hell it's time!" + +And in a whirlwind of flying gloves he flung himself upon Ginger, +driving him across the ring, while Mr. Burrowes, watch in hand, stared +with dropping jaw. If Ginger had seemed a new Ginger to Sally, still +more did this seem a new Bugs Butler to Mr. Burrowes, and the manager +groaned in spirit. Coolness, skill and science--these had been the +qualities in his protégé which had always so endeared him to Mr. Lester +Burrowes and had so enriched their respective bank accounts: and now, on +the eve of the most important fight in his life, before an audience of +newspaper men, he had thrown them all aside and was making an exhibition +of himself with a common sparring-partner. + +That was the bitter blow to Mr. Burrowes. Had this lapse into the +unscientific primitive happened in a regular fight, he might have +mourned and poured reproof into Bug's ear when he got him back in his +corner at the end of the round; but he would not have experienced this +feeling of helpless horror--the sort of horror an elder of the church +might feel if he saw his favourite bishop yielding in public to the +fascination of jazz. It was the fact that Bugs Butler was lowering +himself to extend his powers against a sparring-partner that shocked Mr. +Burrowes. There is an etiquette in these things. A champion may batter +his sparring-partners into insensibility if he pleases, but he must do +it with nonchalance. He must not appear to be really trying. + +And nothing could be more manifest than that Bugs Butler was trying. His +whole fighting soul was in his efforts to corner Ginger and destroy him. +The battle was raging across the ring and down the ring, and up the ring +and back again; yet always Ginger, like a storm-driven ship, contrived +somehow to weather the tempest. Out of the flurry of swinging arms he +emerged time after time bruised, bleeding, but fighting hard. + +For Bugs Butler's fury was defeating its object. Had he remained his +cool and scientific self, he could have demolished Ginger and cut +through his defence in a matter of seconds. But he had lapsed back into +the methods of his unskilled novitiate. He swung and missed, swung and +missed again, struck but found no vital spot. And now there was blood on +his face, too. In some wild mêlée the sacred fount had been tapped, and +his teeth gleamed through a crimson mist. + +The Wise Guys were beyond speech. They were leaning against one another, +punching each other feebly in the back. One was crying. + +And then suddenly the end came, as swiftly and unexpectedly as the +thing had begun. His wild swings had tired Bugs Butler, and with fatigue +prudence returned to him. His feet began once more their subtle weaving +in and out. Twice his left hand flickered home. A quick feint, a short, +jolting stab, and Ginger's guard was down and he was swaying in the +middle of the ring, his hands hanging and his knees a-quiver. + +Bugs Butler measured his distance, and Sally shut her eyes. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV. MR. ABRAHAMS RE-ENGAGES AN OLD EMPLOYEE + + + +1 + + + +The only real happiness, we are told, is to be obtained by bringing +happiness to others. Bugs Butler's mood, accordingly, when some thirty +hours after the painful episode recorded in the last chapter he awoke +from a state of coma in the ring at Jersey City to discover that Mr. Lew +Lucas had knocked him out in the middle of the third round, should have +been one of quiet contentment. His inability to block a short left-hook +followed by a right to the point of the jaw had ameliorated quite a +number of existences. + +Mr. Lew Lucas, for one, was noticeably pleased. So were Mr. Lucas's +seconds, one of whom went so far as to kiss him. And most of the crowd, +who had betted heavily on the champion, were delighted. Yet Bugs Butler +did not rejoice. It is not too much to say that his peevish bearing +struck a jarring note in the general gaiety. A heavy frown disfigured +his face as he slouched from the ring. + +But the happiness which he had spread went on spreading. The two Wise +Guys, who had been unable to attend the fight in person, received the +result on the ticker and exuberantly proclaimed themselves the richer +by five hundred dollars. The pimpled office-boy at the Fillmore Nicholas +Theatrical Enterprises Ltd. caused remark in the Subway by whooping +gleefully when he read the news in his morning paper, for he, too, had +been rendered wealthier by the brittleness of Mr. Butler's chin. And +it was with fierce satisfaction that Sally, breakfasting in her little +apartment, informed herself through the sporting page of the details of +the contender's downfall. She was not a girl who disliked many people, +but she had acquired a lively distaste for Bugs Butler. + +Lew Lucas seemed a man after her own heart. If he had been a personal +friend of Ginger's he could not, considering the brief time at his +disposal, have avenged him with more thoroughness. In round one he had +done all sorts of diverting things to Mr. Butler's left eye: in round +two he had continued the good work on that gentleman's body; and in +round three he had knocked him out. Could anyone have done more? Sally +thought not, and she drank Lew Lucas's health in a cup of coffee and +hoped his old mother was proud of him. + +The telephone bell rang at her elbow. She unhooked the receiver. + +"Hullo?" + +"Oh, hullo," said a voice. + +"Ginger!" cried Sally delightedly. + +"I say, I'm awfully glad you're back. I only got your letter this +morning. Found it at the boarding-house. I happened to look in there +and..." + +"Ginger," interrupted Sally, "your voice is music, but I want to see +you. Where are you?" + +"I'm at a chemist's shop across the street. I was wondering if..." + +"Come here at once!" + +"I say, may I? I was just going to ask." + +"You miserable creature, why haven't you been round to see me before?" + +"Well, as a matter of fact, I haven't been going about much for the last +day. You see..." + +"I know. Of course." Quick sympathy came into Sally's voice. She gave +a sidelong glance of approval and gratitude at the large picture of Lew +Lucas which beamed up at her from the morning paper. "You poor thing! +How are you?" + +"Oh, all right, thanks." + +"Well, hurry." + +There was a slight pause at the other end of the wire. + +"I say." + +"Well?" + +"I'm not much to look at, you know." + +"You never were. Stop talking and hurry over." + +"I mean to say..." + +Sally hung up the receiver firmly. She waited eagerly for some minutes, +and then footsteps came along the passage. They stopped at her door and +the bell rang. Sally ran to the door, flung it open, and recoiled in +consternation. + +"Oh, Ginger!" + +He had stated the facts accurately when he had said that he was not much +to look at. He gazed at her devotedly out of an unblemished right eye, +but the other was hidden altogether by a puffy swelling of dull purple. +A great bruise marred his left cheek-bone, and he spoke with some +difficulty through swollen lips. + +"It's all right, you know," he assured her. + +"It isn't. It's awful! Oh, you poor darling!" She clenched her teeth +viciously. "I wish he had killed him!" + +"Eh?" + +"I wish Lew Lucas or whatever his name is had murdered him. Brute!" + +"Oh, I don't know, you know." Ginger's sense of fairness compelled him +to defend his late employer against these harsh sentiments. "He isn't a +bad sort of chap, really. Bugs Butler, I mean." + +"Do you seriously mean to stand there and tell me you don't loathe the +creature?" + +"Oh, he's all right. See his point of view and all that. Can't blame +him, if you come to think of it, for getting the wind up a bit in the +circs. Bit thick, I mean to say, a sparring-partner going at him like +that. Naturally he didn't think it much of a wheeze. It was my fault +right along. Oughtn't to have done it, of course, but somehow, when he +started making an ass of me and I knew you were looking on... well, it +seemed a good idea to have a dash at doing something on my own. No right +to, of course. A sparring-partner isn't supposed..." + +"Sit down," said Sally. + +Ginger sat down. + +"Ginger," said Sally, "you're too good to live." + +"Oh, I say!" + +"I believe if someone sandbagged you and stole your watch and chain +you'd say there were faults on both sides or something. I'm just a cat, +and I say I wish your beast of a Bugs Butler had perished miserably. +I'd have gone and danced on his grave... But whatever made you go in for +that sort of thing?" + +"Well, it seemed the only job that was going at the moment. I've always +done a goodish bit of boxing and I was very fit and so on, and it looked +to me rather an opening. Gave me something to get along with. You get +paid quite fairly decently, you know, and it's rather a jolly life..." + +"Jolly? Being hammered about like that?" + +"Oh, you don't notice it much. I've always enjoyed scrapping rather. +And, you see, when your brother gave me the push..." + +Sally uttered an exclamation. + +"What an extraordinary thing it is--I went all the way out to White +Plains that afternoon to find Fillmore and tackle him about that and I +didn't say a word about it. And I haven't seen or been able to get hold +of him since." + +"No? Busy sort of cove, your brother." + +"Why did Fillmore let you go?" + +"Let me go? Oh, you mean... well, there was a sort of mix-up. A kind of +misunderstanding." + +"What happened?" + +"Oh, it was nothing. Just a..." + +"What happened?" + +Ginger's disfigured countenance betrayed embarrassment. He looked +awkwardly about the room. + +"It's not worth talking about." + +"It is worth talking about. I've a right to know. It was I who sent you +to Fillmore..." + +"Now that," said Ginger, "was jolly decent of you." + +"Don't interrupt! I sent you to Fillmore, and he had no business to let +you go without saying a word to me. What happened?" + +Ginger twiddled his fingers unhappily. + +"Well, it was rather unfortunate. You see, his wife--I don't know if you +know her?..." + +"Of course I know her." + +"Why, yes, you would, wouldn't you? Your brother's wife, I mean," +said Ginger acutely. "Though, as a matter of fact, you often find +sisters-in-law who won't have anything to do with one another. I know a +fellow..." + +"Ginger," said Sally, "it's no good your thinking you can get out of +telling me by rambling off on other subjects. I'm grim and resolute and +relentless, and I mean to get this story out of you if I have to use a +corkscrew. Fillmore's wife, you were saying..." + +Ginger came back reluctantly to the main theme. + +"Well, she came into the office one morning, and we started fooling +about..." + +"Fooling about?" + +"Well, kind of chivvying each other." + +"Chivvying?" + +"At least I was." + +"You were what?" + +"Sort of chasing her a bit, you know." + +Sally regarded this apostle of frivolity with amazement. + +"What do you mean?" + +Ginger's embarrassment increased. + +"The thing was, you see, she happened to trickle in rather quietly when +I happened to be looking at something, and I didn't know she was there +till she suddenly grabbed it..." + +"Grabbed what?" + +"The thing. The thing I happened to be looking at. She bagged it... +collared it... took it away from me, you know, and wouldn't give it back +and generally started to rot about a bit, so I rather began to chivvy +her to some extent, and I'd just caught her when your brother happened +to roll in. I suppose," said Ginger, putting two and two together, "he +had really come with her to the office and had happened to hang back for +a minute or two, to talk to somebody or something... well, of course, he +was considerably fed to see me apparently doing jiu-jitsu with his wife. +Enough to rattle any man, if you come to think of it," said Ginger, ever +fair-minded. "Well, he didn't say anything at the time, but a bit later +in the day he called me in and administered the push." + +Sally shook her head. + +"It sounds the craziest story to me. What was it that Mrs. Fillmore took +from you?" + +"Oh, just something." + +Sally rapped the table imperiously. + +"Ginger!" + +"Well, as a matter of fact," said her goaded visitor, "It was a +photograph." + +"Who of? Or, if you're particular, of whom?" + +"Well... you, to be absolutely accurate." + +"Me?" Sally stared. "But I've never given you a photograph of myself." + +Ginger's face was a study in scarlet and purple. + +"You didn't exactly give it to me," he mumbled. "When I say give, I +mean..." + +"Good gracious!" Sudden enlightenment came upon Sally. "That photograph +we were hunting for when I first came here! Had you stolen it all the +time?" + +"Why, yes, I did sort of pinch it..." + +"You fraud! You humbug! And you pretended to help me look for it." She +gazed at him almost with respect. "I never knew you were so deep and +snaky. I'm discovering all sorts of new things about you." + +There was a brief silence. Ginger, confession over, seemed a trifle +happier. + +"I hope you're not frightfully sick about it?" he said at length. "It +was lying about, you know, and I rather felt I must have it. Hadn't the +cheek to ask you for it, so..." + +"Don't apologize," said Sally cordially. "Great compliment. So I have +caused your downfall again, have I? I'm certainly your evil genius, +Ginger. I'm beginning to feel like a regular rag and a bone and a hank +of hair. First I egged you on to insult your family--oh, by the way, I +want to thank you about that. Now that I've met your Uncle Donald I can +see how public-spirited you were. I ruined your prospects there, and now +my fatal beauty--cabinet size--has led to your destruction once more. +It's certainly up to me to find you another job, I can see that." + +"No, really, I say, you mustn't bother. I shall be all right." + +"It's my duty. Now what is there that you really can do? Burglary, of +course, but it's not respectable. You've tried being a waiter and a +prize-fighter and a right-hand man, and none of those seems to be just +right. Can't you suggest anything?" + +Ginger shook his head. + +"I shall wangle something, I expect."' + +"Yes, but what? It must be something good this time. I don't want to be +walking along Broadway and come on you suddenly as a street-cleaner. I +don't want to send for an express-man and find you popping up. My +idea would be to go to my bank to arrange an overdraft and be told the +president could give me two minutes and crawl in humbly and find you +prezzing away to beat the band in a big chair. Isn't there anything in +the world that you can do that's solid and substantial and will keep you +out of the poor-house in your old age? Think!" + +"Of course, if I had a bit of capital..." + +"Ah! The business man! And what," inquired Sally, "would you do, Mr. +Morgan, if you had a bit of capital?" + +"Run a dog-thingummy," said Ginger promptly. + +"What's a dog-thingummy?" + +"Why, a thingamajig. For dogs, you know." + +Sally nodded. + +"Oh, a thingamajig for dogs? Now I understand. You will put things so +obscurely at first. Ginger, you poor fish, what are you raving about? +What on earth is a thingamajig for dogs?" + +"I mean a sort of place like fellows have. Breeding dogs, you know, and +selling them and winning prizes and all that. There are lots of them +about." + +"Oh, a kennels?" + +"Yes, a kennels." + +"What a weird mind you have, Ginger. You couldn't say kennels at first, +could you? That wouldn't have made it difficult enough. I suppose, if +anyone asked you where you had your lunch, you would say, 'Oh, at a +thingamajig for mutton chops'... Ginger, my lad, there is something in +this. I believe for the first time in our acquaintance you have spoken +something very nearly resembling a mouthful. You're wonderful with dogs, +aren't you?" + +"I'm dashed keen on them, and I've studied them a bit. As a matter of +fact, though it seems rather like swanking, there isn't much about dogs +that I don't know." + +"Of course. I believe you're a sort of honorary dog yourself. I could +tell it by the way you stopped that fight at Roville. You plunged into a +howling mass of about a million hounds of all species and just whispered +in their ears and they stopped at once. Why, the more one examines this, +the better it looks. I do believe it's the one thing you couldn't help +making a success of. It's very paying, isn't it?" + +"Works out at about a hundred per cent on the original outlay, I've been +told." + +"A hundred per cent? That sounds too much like something of Fillmore's +for comfort. Let's say ninety-nine and be conservative. Ginger, you +have hit it. Say no more. You shall be the Dog King, the biggest +thingamajigger for dogs in the country. But how do you start?" + +"Well, as a matter of fact, while I was up at White Plains, I ran into +a cove who had a place of the sort and wanted to sell out. That was what +made me think of it." + +"You must start to-day. Or early to-morrow." + +"Yes," said Ginger doubtfully. "Of course, there's the catch, you know." + +"What catch?" + +"The capital. You've got to have that. This fellow wouldn't sell out +under five thousand dollars." + +"I'll lend you five thousand dollars." + +"No!" said Ginger. + +Sally looked at him with exasperation. "Ginger, I'd like to slap you," +she said. It was maddening, this intrusion of sentiment into business +affairs. Why, simply because he was a man and she was a woman, +should she be restrained from investing money in a sound commercial +undertaking? If Columbus had taken up this bone-headed stand towards +Queen Isabella, America would never have been discovered. + +"I can't take five thousand dollars off you," said Ginger firmly. + +"Who's talking of taking it off me, as you call it?" stormed Sally. +"Can't you forget your burglarious career for a second? This isn't the +same thing as going about stealing defenceless girls' photographs. This +is business. I think you would make an enormous success of a dog-place, +and you admit you're good, so why make frivolous objections? Why +shouldn't I put money into a good thing? Don't you want me to get rich, +or what is it?" + +Ginger was becoming confused. Argument had never been his strong point. + +"But it's such a lot of money." + +"To you, perhaps. Not to me. I'm a plutocrat. Five thousand dollars! +What's five thousand dollars? I feed it to the birds." + +Ginger pondered woodenly for a while. His was a literal mind, and he +knew nothing of Sally's finances beyond the fact that when he had first +met her she had come into a legacy of some kind. Moreover, he had been +hugely impressed by Fillmore's magnificence. It seemed plain enough that +the Nicholases were a wealthy family. + +"I don't like it, you know," he said. + +"You don't have to like it," said Sally. "You just do it." + +A consoling thought flashed upon Ginger. + +"You'd have to let me pay you interest." + +"Let you? My lad, you'll have to pay me interest. What do you think this +is--a round game? It's a cold business deal." + +"Topping!" said Ginger relieved. "How about twenty-five per cent." + +"Don't be silly," said Sally quickly. "I want three." + +"No, that's all rot," protested Ginger. "I mean to say--three. I don't," +he went on, making a concession, "mind saying twenty." + +"If you insist, I'll make it five. Not more." + +"Well, ten, then?" + +"Five!" + +"Suppose," said Ginger insinuatingly, "I said seven?" + +"I never saw anyone like you for haggling," said Sally with disapproval. +"Listen! Six. And that's my last word." + +"Six?" + +"Six." + +Ginger did sums in his head. + +"But that would only work out at three hundred dollars a year. It isn't +enough." + +"What do you know about it? As if I hadn't been handling this sort of +deal in my life. Six! Do you agree?" + +"I suppose so." + +"Then that's settled. Is this man you talk about in New York?" + +"No, he's down on Long Island at a place on the south shore." + +"I mean, can you get him on the 'phone and clinch the thing?" + +"Oh, yes. I know his address, and I suppose his number's in the book." + +"Then go off at once and settle with him before somebody else snaps him +up. Don't waste a minute." + +Ginger paused at the door. + +"I say, you're absolutely sure about this?''' + +"Of course." + +"I mean to say..." + +"Get on," said Sally. + + + +2 + + + +The window of Sally's sitting-room looked out on to a street +which, while not one of the city's important arteries, was capable, +nevertheless, of affording a certain amount of entertainment to the +observer: and after Ginger had left, she carried the morning paper to +the window-sill and proceeded to divide her attention between a third +reading of the fight-report and a lazy survey of the outer world. It was +a beautiful day, and the outer world was looking its best. + +She had not been at her post for many minutes when a taxi-cab stopped +at the apartment-house, and she was surprised and interested to see her +brother Fillmore heave himself out of the interior. He paid the driver, +and the cab moved off, leaving him on the sidewalk casting a large +shadow in the sunshine. Sally was on the point of calling to him, when +his behaviour became so odd that astonishment checked her. + +From where she sat Fillmore had all the appearance of a man practising +the steps of a new dance, and sheer curiosity as to what he would do +next kept Sally watching in silence. First, he moved in a resolute sort +of way towards the front door; then, suddenly stopping, scuttled back. +This movement he repeated twice, after which he stood in deep thought +before making another dash for the door, which, like the others, came +to an abrupt end as though he had run into some invisible obstacle. And, +finally, wheeling sharply, he bustled off down the street and was lost +to view. + +Sally could make nothing of it. If Fillmore had taken the trouble to +come in a taxi-cab, obviously to call upon her, why had he abandoned the +idea at her very threshold? She was still speculating on this mystery +when the telephone-bell rang, and her brother's voice spoke huskily in +her ear. + +"Sally?" + +"Hullo, Fill. What are you going to call it?" + +"What am I... Call what?" + +"The dance you were doing outside here just now. It's your own +invention, isn't it?" + +"Did you see me?" said Fillmore, upset. + +"Of course I saw you. I was fascinated." + +"I--er--I was coming to have a talk with you. Sally..." + +Fillmore's voice trailed off. + +"Well, why didn't you?" + +There was a pause--on Fillmore's part, if the timbre of at his voice +correctly indicated his feelings, a pause of discomfort. Something was +plainly vexing Fillmore's great mind. + +"Sally," he said at last, and coughed hollowly into the receiver. + +"Yes." + +"I--that is to say, I have asked Gladys... Gladys will be coming to see +you very shortly. Will you be in?" + +"I'll stay in. How is Gladys? I'm longing to see her again." + +"She is very well. A trifle--a little upset." + +"Upset? What about?" + +"She will tell you when she arrives. I have just been 'phoning to her. +She is coming at once." There was another pause. "I'm afraid she has bad +news." + +"What news?" + +There was silence at the other end of the wire. + +"What news?" repeated Sally, a little sharply. She hated mysteries. + +But Fillmore had rung off. Sally hung up the receiver thoughtfully. She +was puzzled and anxious. However, there being nothing to be gained by +worrying, she carried the breakfast things into the kitchen and tried to +divert herself by washing up. Presently a ring at the door-bell brought +her out, to find her sister-in-law. + +Marriage, even though it had brought with it the lofty position of +partnership with the Hope of the American Stage, had effected no +noticeable alteration in the former Miss Winch. As Mrs. Fillmore she +was the same square, friendly creature. She hugged Sally in a muscular +manner and went on in the sitting-room. + +"Well, it's great seeing you again," she said. "I began to think you +were never coming back. What was the big idea, springing over to England +like that?" + +Sally had been expecting the question, and answered it with composure. + +"I wanted to help Mr. Faucitt." + +"Who's Mr. Faucitt?" + +"Hasn't Fillmore ever mentioned him? He was a dear old man at the +boarding-house, and his brother died and left him a dressmaking +establishment in London. He screamed to me to come and tell him what to +do about it. He has sold it now and is quite happy in the country." + +"Well, the trip's done you good," said Mrs. Fillmore. "You're prettier +than ever." + +There was a pause. Already, in these trivial opening exchanges, Sally +had sensed a suggestion of unwonted gravity in her companion. She missed +that careless whimsicality which had been the chief characteristic of +Miss Gladys Winch and seemed to have been cast off by Mrs. Fillmore +Nicholas. At their meeting, before she had spoken, Sally had not +noticed this, but now it was apparent that something was weighing on her +companion. Mrs. Fillmore's honest eyes were troubled. + +"What's the bad news?" asked Sally abruptly. She wanted to end the +suspense. "Fillmore was telling me over the 'phone that you had some bad +news for me." + +Mrs. Fillmore scratched at the carpet for a moment with the end of her +parasol without replying. When she spoke it was not in answer to the +question. + +"Sally, who's this man Carmyle over in England?" + +"Oh, did Fillmore tell you about him?" + +"He told me there was a rich fellow over in England who was crazy about +you and had asked you to marry him, and that you had turned him down." + +Sally's momentary annoyance faded. She could hardly, she felt, have +expected Fillmore to refrain from mentioning the matter to his wife. + +"Yes," she said. "That's true." + +"You couldn't write and say you've changed your mind?" + +Sally's annoyance returned. All her life she had been intensely +independent, resentful of interference with her private concerns. + +"I suppose I could if I had--but I haven't. Did Fillmore tell you to try +to talk me round?" + +"Oh, I'm not trying to talk you round," said Mrs. Fillmore quickly. +"Goodness knows, I'm the last person to try and jolly anyone into +marrying anybody if they didn't feel like it. I've seen too many +marriages go wrong to do that. Look at Elsa Doland." + +Sally's heart jumped as if an exposed nerve had been touched. + +"Elsa?" she stammered, and hated herself because her voice shook. +"Has--has her marriage gone wrong?" + +"Gone all to bits," said Mrs. Fillmore shortly. "You remember she +married Gerald Foster, the man who wrote 'The Primrose Way'?" + +Sally with an effort repressed an hysterical laugh. + +"Yes, I remember," she said. + +"Well, it's all gone bloo-ey. I'll tell you about that in a minute. +Coming back to this man in England, if you're in any doubt about it... +I mean, you can't always tell right away whether you're fond of a man or +not... When first I met Fillmore, I couldn't see him with a spy-glass, +and now he's just the whole shooting-match... But that's not what I +wanted to talk about. I was saying one doesn't always know one's +own mind at first, and if this fellow really is a good fellow... and +Fillmore tells me he's got all the money in the world..." + +Sally stopped her. + +"No, it's no good. I don't want to marry Mr. Carmyle." + +"That's that, then," said Mrs. Fillmore. "It's a pity, though." + +"Why are you taking it so much to heart?" said Sally with a nervous +laugh. + +"Well..." Mrs. Fillmore paused. Sally's anxiety was growing. It must, +she realized, be something very serious indeed that had happened if it +had the power to make her forthright sister-in-law disjointed in her +talk. "You see..." went on Mrs. Fillmore, and stopped again. "Gee! I'm +hating this!" she murmured. + +"What is it? I don't understand." + +"You'll find it's all too darned clear by the time I'm through," said +Mrs. Fillmore mournfully. "If I'm going to explain this thing, I +guess I'd best start at the beginning. You remember that revue of +Fillmore's--the one we both begged him not to put on. It flopped!" + +"Oh!" + +"Yes. It flopped on the road and died there. Never got to New York at +all. Ike Schumann wouldn't let Fillmore have a theatre. The book wanted +fixing and the numbers wanted fixing and the scenery wasn't right: and +while they were tinkering with all that there was trouble about the +cast and the Actors Equity closed the show. Best thing that could have +happened, really, and I was glad at the time, because going on with +it would only have meant wasting more money, and it had cost a fortune +already. After that Fillmore put on a play of Gerald Foster's and that +was a frost, too. It ran a week at the Booth. I hear the new piece he's +got in rehearsal now is no good either. It's called 'The Wild Rose,' or +something. But Fillmore's got nothing to do with that." + +"But..." Sally tried to speak, but Mrs. Fillmore went on. + +"Don't talk just yet, or I shall never get this thing straight. Well, +you know Fillmore, poor darling. Anyone else would have pulled in his +horns and gone slow for a spell, but he's one of those fellows whose +horse is always going to win the next race. The big killing is always +just round the corner with him. Funny how you can see what a chump a man +is and yet love him to death... I remember saying something like that to +you before... He thought he could get it all back by staging this fight +of his that came off in Jersey City last night. And if everything had +gone right he might have got afloat again. But it seems as if he can't +touch anything without it turning to mud. On the very day before the +fight was to come off, the poor mutt who was going against the champion +goes and lets a sparring-partner of his own knock him down and fool +around with him. With all the newspaper men there too! You probably +saw about it in the papers. It made a great story for them. Well, that +killed the whole thing. The public had never been any too sure that this +fellow Bugs Butler had a chance of putting up a scrap with the champion +that would be worth paying to see; and, when they read that he couldn't +even stop his sparring-partners slamming him all around the place they +simply decided to stay away. Poor old Fill! It was a finisher for +him. The house wasn't a quarter full, and after he'd paid these two +pluguglies their guarantees, which they insisted on having before they'd +so much as go into the ring, he was just about cleaned out. So there you +are!" + +Sally had listened with dismay to this catalogue of misfortunes. + +"Oh, poor Fill!" she cried. "How dreadful!" + +"Pretty tough." + +"But 'The Primrose Way' is a big success, isn't it?" said Sally, anxious +to discover something of brightness in the situation. + +"It was." Mrs. Fillmore flushed again. "This is the part I hate having +to tell you." + +"It was? Do you mean it isn't still? I thought Elsa had made such a +tremendous hit. I read about it when I was over in London. It was even +in one of the English papers." + +"Yes, she made a hit all right," said Mrs. Fillmore drily. "She made +such a hit that all the other managements in New York were after her +right away, and Fillmore had hardly sailed when she handed in her notice +and signed up with Goble and Cohn for a new piece they are starring her +in." + +"Ah, she couldn't!" cried Sally. + +"My dear, she did! She's out on the road with it now. I had to break the +news to poor old Fillmore at the dock when he landed. It was rather a +blow. I must say it wasn't what I would call playing the game. I know +there isn't supposed to be any sentiment in business, but after all we +had given Elsa her big chance. But Fillmore wouldn't put her name up +over the theatre in electrics, and Goble and Cohn made it a clause in +her contract that they would, so nothing else mattered. People are like +that." + +"But Elsa... She used not to be like that." + +"They all get that way. They must grab success if it's to be grabbed. +I suppose you can't blame them. You might just as well expect a cat to +keep off catnip. Still, she might have waited to the end of the New York +run." Mrs. Fillmore put out her hand and touched Sally's. "Well, I've +got it out now," she said, "and, believe me, it was one rotten job. You +don't know how sorry I am. Sally. I wouldn't have had it happen for a +million dollars. Nor would Fillmore. I'm not sure that I blame him for +getting cold feet and backing out of telling you himself. He just hadn't +the nerve to come and confess that he had fooled away your money. He was +hoping all along that this fight would pan out big and that he'd be +able to pay you back what you had loaned him, but things didn't happen +right." + +Sally was silent. She was thinking how strange it was that this room in +which she had hoped to be so happy had been from the first moment of her +occupancy a storm centre of bad news and miserable disillusionment. In +this first shock of the tidings, it was the disillusionment that hurt +most. She had always been so fond of Elsa, and Elsa had always seemed +so fond of her. She remembered that letter of Elsa's with all its +protestations of gratitude... It wasn't straight. It was horrible. +Callous, selfish, altogether horrible... + +"It's..." She choked, as a rush of indignation brought the tears to her +eyes. "It's... beastly! I'm... I'm not thinking about my money. That's +just bad luck. But Elsa..." + +Mrs. Fillmore shrugged her square shoulders. + +"Well, it's happening all the time in the show business," she said. "And +in every other business, too, I guess, if one only knew enough about +them to be able to say. Of course, it hits you hard because Elsa was a +pal of yours, and you're thinking she might have considered you after +all you've done for her. I can't say I'm much surprised myself." Mrs. +Fillmore was talking rapidly, and dimly Sally understood that she was +talking so that talk would carry her over this bad moment. Silence now +would have been unendurable. "I was in the company with her, and it +sometimes seems to me as if you can't get to know a person right through +till you've been in the same company with them. Elsa's all right, but +she's two people really, like these dual identity cases you read about. +She's awfully fond of you. I know she is. She was always saying so, +and it was quite genuine. If it didn't interfere with business there's +nothing she wouldn't do for you. But when it's a case of her career you +don't count. Nobody counts. Not even her husband. Now that's funny. +If you think that sort of thing funny. Personally, it gives me the +willies." + +"What's funny?" asked Sally, dully. + +"Well, you weren't there, so you didn't see it, but I was on the spot +all the time, and I know as well as I know anything that he simply +married her because he thought she could get him on in the game. He +hardly paid any attention to her at all till she was such a riot in +Chicago, and then he was all over her. And now he's got stung. She +throws down his show and goes off to another fellow's. It's like +marrying for money and finding the girl hasn't any. And she's got stung, +too, in a way, because I'm pretty sure she married him mostly because +she thought he was going to be the next big man in the play-writing +business and could boost her up the ladder. And now it doesn't look as +though he had another success in him. The result is they're at outs. I +hear he's drinking. Somebody who'd seen him told me he had gone all to +pieces. You haven't seen him, I suppose?" + +"No." + +"I thought maybe you might have run into him. He lives right opposite." + +Sally clutched at the arm of her chair. + +"Lives right opposite? Gerald Foster? What do you mean?" + +"Across the passage there," said Mrs. Fillmore, jerking her thumb at the +door. "Didn't you know? That's right, I suppose you didn't. They moved +in after you had beaten it for England. Elsa wanted to be near you, and +she was tickled to death when she found there was an apartment to be had +right across from you. Now, that just proves what I was saying a while +ago about Elsa. If she wasn't fond of you, would she go out of her way +to camp next door? And yet, though she's so fond of you, she doesn't +hesitate about wrecking your property by quitting the show when she sees +a chance of doing herself a bit of good. It's funny, isn't it?" + +The telephone-bell, tinkling sharply, rescued Sally from the necessity +of a reply. She forced herself across the room to answer it. + +"Hullo?" + +Ginger's voice spoke jubilantly. + +"Hullo. Are you there? I say, it's all right, about that binge, you +know." + +"Oh, yes?" + +"That dog fellow, you know," said Ginger, with a slight diminution of +exuberance. His sensitive ear had seemed to detect a lack of animation +in her voice. "I've just been talking to him over the 'phone, and it's +all settled. If," he added, with a touch of doubt, "you still feel like +going into it, I mean." + +There was an instant in which Sally hesitated, but it was only an +instant. + +"Why, of course," she said, steadily. "Why should you think I had +changed my mind?" + +"Well, I thought... that is to say, you seemed... oh, I don't know." + +"You imagine things. I was a little worried about something when you +called me up, and my mind wasn't working properly. Of course, go ahead +with it. Ginger. I'm delighted." + +"I say, I'm awfully sorry you're worried." + +"Oh. it's all right." + +"Something bad?" + +"Nothing that'll kill me. I'm young and strong." + +Ginger was silent for a moment. + +"I say, I don't want to butt in, but can I do anything?" + +"No, really, Ginger, I know you would do anything you could, but this +is just something I must worry through by myself. When do you go down to +this place?" + +"I was thinking of popping down this afternoon, just to take a look +round." + +"Let me know what train you're making and I'll come and see you off." + +"That's ripping of you. Right ho. Well, so long." + +"So long," said Sally. + +Mrs. Fillmore, who had been sitting in that state of suspended animation +which comes upon people who are present at a telephone conversation +which has nothing to do with themselves, came to life as Sally replaced +the receiver. + +"Sally," she said, "I think we ought to have a talk now about what +you're going to do." + +Sally was not feeling equal to any discussion of the future. All she +asked of the world at the moment was to be left alone. + +"Oh, that's all right. I shall manage. You ought to be worrying about +Fillmore." + +"Fillmore's got me to look after him," said Gladys, with quiet +determination. "You're the one that's on my mind. I lay awake all last +night thinking about you. As far as I can make out from Fillmore, you've +still a few thousand dollars left. Well, as it happens, I can put you on +to a really good thing. I know a girl..." + +"I'm afraid," interrupted Sally, "all the rest of my money, what there +is of it, is tied up." + +"You can't get hold of it?" + +"No." + +"But listen," said Mrs. Fillmore, urgently. "This is a really good +thing. This girl I know started an interior decorating business some +time ago and is pulling in the money in handfuls. But she wants more +capital, and she's willing to let go of a third of the business to +anyone who'll put in a few thousand. She won't have any difficulty +getting it, but I 'phoned her this morning to hold off till I'd heard +from you. Honestly, Sally, it's the chance of a lifetime. It would put +you right on easy street. Isn't there really any way you could get your +money out of this other thing and take on this deal?" + +"There really isn't. I'm awfully obliged to you, Gladys dear, but it's +impossible." + +"Well," said Mrs. Fillmore, prodding the carpet energetically with her +parasol, "I don't know what you've gone into, but, unless they've given +you a share in the Mint or something, you'll be losing by not making the +switch. You're sure you can't do it?" + +"I really can't." + +Mrs. Fillmore rose, plainly disappointed. + +"Well, you know best, of course. Gosh! What a muddle everything is. +Sally," she said, suddenly stopping at the door, "you're not going to +hate poor old Fillmore over this, are you?" + +"Why, of course not. The whole thing was just bad luck." + +"He's worried stiff about it." + +"Well, give him my love, and tell him not to be so silly." + +Mrs. Fillmore crossed the room and kissed Sally impulsively. + +"You're an angel," she said. "I wish there were more like you. But I +guess they've lost the pattern. Well, I'll go back and tell Fillmore +that. It'll relieve him." + +The door closed, and Sally sat down with her chin in her hands to think. + + + +3 + + + +Mr. Isadore Abrahams, the founder and proprietor of that deservedly +popular dancing resort poetically named "The Flower Garden," leaned back +in his chair with a contented sigh and laid down the knife and fork +with which he had been assailing a plateful of succulent goulash. He was +dining, as was his admirable custom, in the bosom of his family at his +residence at Far Rockaway. Across the table, his wife, Rebecca, beamed +at him over her comfortable plinth of chins, and round the table his +children, David, Jacob, Morris and Saide, would have beamed at him +if they had not been too busy at the moment ingurgitating goulash. +A genial, honest, domestic man was Mr. Abrahams, a credit to the +community. + +"Mother," he said. + +"Pa?" said Mrs. Abrahams. + +"Knew there was something I'd meant to tell you," said Mr. Abrahams, +absently chasing a piece of bread round his plate with a stout finger. +"You remember that girl I told you about some time back--girl working at +the Garden--girl called Nicholas, who came into a bit of money and threw +up her job..." + +"I remember. You liked her. Jakie, dear, don't gobble." + +"Ain't gobbling," said Master Abrahams. + +"Everybody liked her," said Mr. Abrahams. "The nicest girl I ever hired, +and I don't hire none but nice girls, because the Garden's a nice place, +and I like to run it nice. I wouldn't give you a nickel for any of your +tough joints where you get nothing but low-lifes and scare away all the +real folks. Everybody liked Sally Nicholas. Always pleasant and always +smiling, and never anything but the lady. It was a treat to have her +around. Well, what do you think?" + +"Dead?" inquired Mrs. Abrahams, apprehensively. The story had sounded to +her as though it were heading that way. "Wipe your mouth, Jakie dear." + +"No, not dead," said Mr. Abrahams, conscious for the first time that the +remainder of his narrative might be considered by a critic something +of an anti-climax and lacking in drama. "But she was in to see me this +afternoon and wants her job back." + +"Ah!" said Mrs. Abrahams, rather tonelessly. An ardent supporter of the +local motion-picture palace, she had hoped for a slightly more gingery +denouement, something with a bit more punch. + +"Yes, but don't it show you?" continued Mr. Abrahams, gallantly trying +to work up the interest. "There's this girl, goes out of my place not +more'n a year ago, with a good bank-roll in her pocket, and here she is, +back again, all of it spent. Don't it show you what a tragedy life is, +if you see what I mean, and how careful one ought to be about money? +It's what I call a human document. Goodness knows how she's been and +gone and spent it all. I'd never have thought she was the sort of girl +to go gadding around. Always seemed to me to be kind of sensible." + +"What's gadding, Pop?" asked Master Jakie, the goulash having ceased to +chain his interest. + +"Well, she wanted her job back and I gave it to her, and glad to get her +back again. There's class to that girl. She's the sort of girl I want +in the place. Don't seem quite to have so much get-up in her as she used +to... seems kind of quieted down... but she's got class, and I'm glad +she's back. I hope she'll stay. But don't it show you?" + +"Ah!" said Mrs. Abrahams, with more enthusiasm than before. It had not +worked out such a bad story after all. In its essentials it was not +unlike the film she had seen the previous evening--Gloria Gooch in "A +Girl against the World." + +"Pop!" said Master Abrahams. + +"Yes, Jakie?" + +"When I'm grown up, I won't never lose no money. I'll put it in the bank +and save it." + +The slight depression caused by the contemplation of Sally's troubles +left Mr. Abrahams as mist melts beneath a sunbeam. + +"That's a good boy, Jakie," he said. + +He felt in his waistcoat pocket, found a dime, put it back again, and +bent forward and patted Master Abrahams on the head. + + + + +CHAPTER XV. UNCLE DONALD SPEAKS HIS MIND + + + +There is in certain men--and Bruce Carmyle was one of them--a quality of +resilience, a sturdy refusal to acknowledge defeat, which aids them as +effectively in affairs of the heart as in encounters of a sterner and +more practical kind. As a wooer, Bruce Carmyle resembled that durable +type of pugilist who can only give of his best after he has received +at least one substantial wallop on some tender spot. Although Sally had +refused his offer of marriage quite definitely at Monk's Crofton, it had +never occurred to him to consider the episode closed. All his life he +had been accustomed to getting what he wanted, and he meant to get it +now. + +He was quite sure that he wanted Sally. There had been moments when +he had been conscious of certain doubts, but in the smart of temporary +defeat these had vanished. That streak of Bohemianism in her which from +time to time since their first meeting had jarred upon his orderly +mind was forgotten; and all that Mr. Carmyle could remember was the +brightness of her eyes, the jaunty lift of her chin, and the gallant +trimness of her. Her gay prettiness seemed to flick at him like a whip +in the darkness of wakeful nights, lashing him to pursuit. And quietly +and methodically, like a respectable wolf settling on the trail of a Red +Riding Hood, he prepared to pursue. Delicacy and imagination might have +kept him back, but in these qualities he had never been strong. One +cannot have everything. + +His preparations for departure, though he did his best to make them +swiftly and secretly, did not escape the notice of the Family. In many +English families there seems to exist a system of inter-communication +and news-distribution like that of those savage tribes in Africa who +pass the latest item of news and interest from point to point over +miles of intervening jungle by some telepathic method never properly +explained. On his last night in London, there entered to Bruce +Carmyle at his apartment in South Audley Street, the Family's chosen +representative, the man to whom the Family pointed with pride--Uncle +Donald, in the flesh. + +There were two hundred and forty pounds of the flesh Uncle Donald was +in, and the chair in which he deposited it creaked beneath its burden. +Once, at Monk's Crofton, Sally had spoiled a whole morning for her +brother Fillmore, by indicating Uncle Donald as the exact image of +what he would be when he grew up. A superstition, cherished from early +schooldays, that he had a weak heart had caused the Family's managing +director to abstain from every form of exercise for nearly fifty years; +and, as he combined with a distaste for exercise one of the three +heartiest appetites in the south-western postal division of London, +Uncle Donald, at sixty-two, was not a man one would willingly have +lounging in one's armchairs. Bruce Carmyle's customary respectfulness +was tinged with something approaching dislike as he looked at him. + +Uncle Donald's walrus moustache heaved gently upon his laboured breath, +like seaweed on a ground-swell. There had been stairs to climb. + +"What's this? What's this?" he contrived to ejaculate at last. "You +packing?" + +"Yes," said Mr. Carmyle, shortly. For the first time in his life he was +conscious of that sensation of furtive guilt which was habitual with his +cousin Ginger when in the presence of this large, mackerel-eyed man. + +"You going away?" + +"Yes." + +"Where you going?" + +"America." + +"When you going?" + +"To-morrow morning." + +"Why you going?" + +This dialogue has been set down as though it had been as brisk and +snappy as any cross-talk between vaudeville comedians, but in reality +Uncle Donald's peculiar methods of conversation had stretched it over +a period of nearly three minutes: for after each reply and before each +question he had puffed and sighed and inhaled his moustache with +such painful deliberation that his companion's nerves were finding it +difficult to bear up under the strain. + +"You're going after that girl," said Uncle Donald, accusingly. + +Bruce Carmyle flushed darkly. And it is interesting to record that at +this moment there flitted through his mind the thought that Ginger's +behaviour at Bleke's Coffee House, on a certain notable occasion, had +not been so utterly inexcusable as he had supposed. There was no doubt +that the Family's Chosen One could be trying. + +"Will you have a whisky and soda, Uncle Donald?" he said, by way of +changing the conversation. + +"Yes," said his relative, in pursuance of a vow he had made in the early +eighties never to refuse an offer of this kind. "Gimme!" + +You would have thought that that would have put matters on a pleasanter +footing. But no. Having lapped up the restorative, Uncle Donald returned +to the attack quite un-softened. + +"Never thought you were a fool before," he said severely. + +Bruce Carmyle's proud spirit chafed. This sort of interview, which had +become a commonplace with his cousin Ginger, was new to him. Hitherto, +his actions had received neither criticism nor been subjected to it. + +"I'm not a fool." + +"You are a fool. A damn fool," continued Uncle Donald, specifying more +exactly. "Don't like the girl. Never did. Not a nice girl. Didn't like +her. Right from the first." + +"Need we discuss this?" said Bruce Carmyle, dropping, as he was apt to +do, into the grand manner. + +The Head of the Family drank in a layer of moustache and blew it out +again. + +"Need we discuss it?" he said with asperity. "We're going to discuss it! +Whatch think I climbed all these blasted stairs for with my weak heart? +Gimme another!" + +Mr. Carmyle gave him another. + +"'S a bad business," moaned Uncle Donald, having gone through the +movements once more. "Shocking bad business. If your poor father were +alive, whatch think he'd say to your tearing across the world after this +girl? I'll tell you what he'd say. He'd say... What kind of whisky's +this?" + +"O'Rafferty Special." + +"New to me. Not bad. Quite good. Sound. Mellow. Wherej get it?" + +"Bilby's in Oxford Street." + +"Must order some. Mellow. He'd say... well, God knows what he'd say. +Whatch doing it for? Whatch doing it for? That's what I can't see. None +of us can see. Puzzles your uncle George. Baffles your aunt Geraldine. +Nobody can understand it. Girl's simply after your money. Anyone can see +that." + +"Pardon me, Uncle Donald," said Mr. Carmyle, stiffly, "but that is +surely rather absurd. If that were the case, why should she have refused +me at Monk's Crofton?" + +"Drawing you on," said Uncle Donald, promptly. "Luring you on. +Well-known trick. Girl in 1881, when I was at Oxford, tried to lure me +on. If I hadn't had some sense and a weak heart... Whatch know of this +girl? Whatch know of her? That's the point. Who is she? Wherej meet +her?" + +"I met her at Roville, in France." + +"Travelling with her family?" + +"Travelling alone," said Bruce Carmyle, reluctantly. + +"Not even with that brother of hers? Bad!" said Uncle Donald. "Bad, +bad!" + +"American girls are accustomed to more independence than English girls." + +"That young man," said Uncle Donald, pursuing a train of thought, "is +going to be fat one of these days, if he doesn't look out. Travelling +alone, was she? What did you do? Catch her eye on the pier?" + +"Really, Uncle Donald!" + +"Well, must have got to know her somehow." + +"I was introduced to her by Lancelot. She was a friend of his." + +"Lancelot!" exploded Uncle Donald, quivering all over like a smitten +jelly at the loathed name. "Well, that shows you what sort of a girl she +is. Any girl that would be a friend of... Unpack!" + +"I beg your pardon?" + +"Unpack! Mustn't go on with this foolery. Out of the question. Find some +girl make you a good wife. Your aunt Mary's been meeting some people +name of Bassington-Bassington, related Kent Bassington-Bassingtons... +eldest daughter charming girl, just do for you." + +Outside the pages of the more old-fashioned type of fiction nobody ever +really ground his teeth, but Bruce Carmyle came nearer to it at that +moment than anyone had ever come before. He scowled blackly, and the +last trace of suavity left him. + +"I shall do nothing of the kind," he said briefly. "I sail to-morrow." + +Uncle Donald had had a previous experience of being defied by a nephew, +but it had not accustomed him to the sensation. He was aware of an +unpleasant feeling of impotence. Nothing is harder than to know what to +do next when defied. + +"Eh?" he said. + +Mr. Carmyle having started to defy, evidently decided to make a good job +of it. + +"I am over twenty-one," said he. "I am financially independent. I shall +do as I please." + +"But, consider!" pleaded Uncle Donald, painfully conscious of the +weakness of his words. "Reflect!" + +"I have reflected." + +"Your position in the county..." + +"I've thought of that." + +"You could marry anyone you pleased." + +"I'm going to." + +"You are determined to go running off to God-knows-where after this Miss +I-can't-even-remember-her-dam-name?" + +"Yes." + +"Have you considered," said Uncle Donald, portentously, "that you owe a +duty to the Family." + +Bruce Carmyle's patience snapped and he sank like a stone to absolutely +Gingerian depths of plain-spokenness. + +"Oh, damn the Family!" he cried. + +There was a painful silence, broken only by the relieved sigh of the +armchair as Uncle Donald heaved himself out of it. + +"After that," said Uncle Donald, "I have nothing more to say." + +"Good!" said Mr. Carmyle rudely, lost to all shame. + +"'Cept this. If you come back married to that girl, I'll cut you in +Piccadilly. By George, I will!" + +He moved to the door. Bruce Carmyle looked down his nose without +speaking. A tense moment. + +"What," asked Uncle Donald, his fingers on the handle, "did you say it +was called?" + +"What was what called?" + +"That whisky." + +"O'Rafferty Special." + +"And wherj get it?" + +"Bilby's, in Oxford Street." + +"I'll make a note of it," said Uncle Donald. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI. AT THE FLOWER GARDEN + + + +1 + + + +"And after all I've done for her," said Mr. Reginald Cracknell, his +voice tremulous with self-pity and his eyes moist with the combined +effects of anguish and over-indulgence in his celebrated private stock, +"after all I've done for her she throws me down." + +Sally did not reply. The orchestra of the Flower Garden was of a calibre +that discouraged vocal competition; and she was having, moreover, +too much difficulty in adjusting her feet to Mr. Cracknell's erratic +dance-steps to employ her attention elsewhere. They manoeuvred jerkily +past the table where Miss Mabel Hobson, the Flower Garden's newest +"hostess," sat watching the revels with a distant hauteur. Miss Hobson +was looking her most regal in old gold and black, and a sorrowful gulp +escaped the stricken Mr. Cracknell as he shambled beneath her eye. + +"If I told you," he moaned in Sally's ear, "what... was that your ankle? +Sorry! Don't know what I'm doing to-night... If I told you what I had +spent on that woman, you wouldn't believe it. And then she throws me +down. And all because I said I didn't like her in that hat. She hasn't +spoken to me for a week, and won't answer when I call up on the 'phone. +And I was right, too. It was a rotten hat. Didn't suit her a bit. But +that," said Mr. Cracknell, morosely, "is a woman all over!" + +Sally uttered a stifled exclamation as his wandering foot descended on +hers before she could get it out of the way. Mr. Cracknell interpreted +the ejaculation as a protest against the sweeping harshness of his last +remark, and gallantly tried to make amends. + +"I don't mean you're like that," he said. "You're different. I could see +that directly I saw you. You have a sympathetic nature. That's why I'm +telling you all this. You're a sensible and broad-minded girl and can +understand. I've done everything for that woman. I got her this job as +hostess here--you wouldn't believe what they pay her. I starred her in +a show once. Did you see those pearls she was wearing? I gave her those. +And she won't speak to me. Just because I didn't like her hat. I wish +you could have seen that hat. You would agree with me, I know, because +you're a sensible, broad-minded girl and understand hats. I don't know +what to do. I come here every night." Sally was aware of this. She had +seen him often, but this was the first time that Lee Schoenstein, the +gentlemanly master of ceremonies, had inflicted him on her. "I come here +every night and dance past her table, but she won't look at me. What," +asked Mr. Cracknell, tears welling in his pale eyes, "would you do about +it?" + +"I don't know," said Sally, frankly. + +"Nor do I. I thought you wouldn't, because you're a sensible, +broad-minded... I mean, nor do I. I'm having one last try to-night, if +you can keep a secret. You won't tell anyone, will you?" pleaded Mr. +Cracknell, urgently. "But I know you won't because you're a sensible... +I'm giving her a little present. Having it brought here to-night. Little +present. That ought to soften her, don't you think?" + +"A big one would do it better." + +Mr. Cracknell kicked her on the shin in a dismayed sort of way. + +"I never thought of that. Perhaps you're right. But it's too late now. +Still, it might. Or wouldn't it? Which do you think?" + +"Yes," said Sally. + +"I thought as much," said Mr. Cracknell. + +The orchestra stopped with a thump and a bang, leaving Mr. Cracknell +clapping feebly in the middle of the floor. Sally slipped back to her +table. Her late partner, after an uncertain glance about him, as if +he had mislaid something but could not remember what, zigzagged off in +search of his own seat. The noise of many conversations, drowned by the +music, broke out with renewed vigour. The hot, close air was full of +voices; and Sally, pressing her hands on her closed eyes, was reminded +once more that she had a headache. + +Nearly a month had passed since her return to Mr. Abrahams' employment. +It had been a dull, leaden month, a monotonous succession of lifeless +days during which life had become a bad dream. In some strange nightmare +fashion, she seemed nowadays to be cut off from her kind. It was weeks +since she had seen a familiar face. None of the companions of her +old boarding-house days had crossed her path. Fillmore, no doubt from +uneasiness of conscience, had not sought her out, and Ginger was working +out his destiny on the south shore of Long Island. + +She lowered her hands and opened her eyes and looked at the room. It was +crowded, as always. The Flower Garden was one of the many establishments +of the same kind which had swum to popularity on the rising flood of +New York's dancing craze; and doubtless because, as its proprietor had +claimed, it was a nice place and run nice, it had continued, unlike many +of its rivals, to enjoy unvarying prosperity. In its advertisement, +it described itself as "a supper-club for after-theatre dining and +dancing," adding that "large and spacious, and sumptuously appointed," +it was "one of the town's wonder-places, with its incomparable +dance-floor, enchanting music, cuisine, and service de luxe." From which +it may be gathered, even without his personal statements to that effect, +that Isadore Abrahams thought well of the place. + +There had been a time when Sally had liked it, too. In her first period +of employment there she had found it diverting, stimulating and full of +entertainment. But in those days she had never had headaches or, what +was worse, this dreadful listless depression which weighed her down and +made her nightly work a burden. + +"Miss Nicholas." + +The orchestra, never silent for long at the Flower Garden, had started +again, and Lee Schoenstein, the master of ceremonies, was presenting a +new partner. She got up mechanically. + +"This is the first time I have been in this place," said the man, as +they bumped over the crowded floor. He was big and clumsy, of course. +To-night it seemed to Sally that the whole world was big and clumsy. +"It's a swell place. I come from up-state myself. We got nothing like +this where I come from." He cleared a space before him, using Sally as +a battering-ram, and Sally, though she had not enjoyed her recent +excursion with Mr. Cracknell, now began to look back to it almost with +wistfulness. This man was undoubtedly the worst dancer in America. + +"Give me li'l old New York," said the man from up-state, +unpatriotically. "It's good enough for me. I been to some swell shows +since I got to town. You seen this year's 'Follies'?" + +"No." + +"You go," said the man earnestly. "You go! Take it from me, it's a swell +show. You seen 'Myrtle takes a Turkish Bath'?" + +"I don't go to many theatres." + +"You go! It's a scream. I been to a show every night since I got here. +Every night regular. Swell shows all of 'em, except this last one. +I cert'nly picked a lemon to-night all right. I was taking a chance, +y'see, because it was an opening. Thought it would be something to +say, when I got home, that I'd been to a New York opening. Set me back +two-seventy-five, including tax, and I wish I'd got it in my kick +right now. 'The Wild Rose,' they called it," he said satirically, as +if exposing a low subterfuge on the part of the management. "'The Wild +Rose!' It sure made me wild all right. Two dollars seventy-five tossed +away, just like that." + +Something stirred in Sally's memory. Why did that title seem so +familiar? Then, with a shock, she remembered. It was Gerald's new play. +For some time after her return to New York, she had been haunted by the +fear lest, coming out of her apartment, she might meet him coming out of +his; and then she had seen a paragraph in her morning paper which had +relieved her of this apprehension. Gerald was out on the road with a new +play, and "The Wild Rose," she was almost sure, was the name of it. + +"Is that Gerald Foster's play?" she asked quickly. + +"I don't know who wrote it," said her partner, "but let me tell you he's +one lucky guy to get away alive. There's fellows breaking stones on the +Ossining Road that's done a lot less to deserve a sentence. Wild Rose! +I'll tell the world it made me go good and wild," said the man from +up-state, an economical soul who disliked waste and was accustomed to +spread out his humorous efforts so as to give them every chance. "Why, +before the second act was over, the people were beating it for the +exits, and if it hadn't been for someone shouting 'Women and children +first' there'd have been a panic." + +Sally found herself back at her table without knowing clearly how she +had got there. + +"Miss Nicholas." + +She started to rise, and was aware suddenly that this was not the voice +of duty calling her once more through the gold teeth of Mr. Schoenstein. +The man who had spoken her name had seated himself beside her, and was +talking in precise, clipped accents, oddly familiar. The mist cleared +from her eyes and she recognized Bruce Carmyle. + + + +2 + + + +"I called at your place," Mr. Carmyle was saying, "and the hall porter +told me that you were here, so I ventured to follow you. I hope you do +not mind? May I smoke?" + +He lit a cigarette with something of an air. His fingers trembled as he +raised the match, but he flattered himself that there was nothing +else in his demeanour to indicate that he was violently excited. +Bruce Carmyle's ideal was the strong man who can rise superior to his +emotions. He was alive to the fact that this was an embarrassing moment, +but he was determined not to show that he appreciated it. He cast a +sideways glance at Sally, and thought that never, not even in the garden +at Monk's Crofton on a certain momentous occasion, had he seen her +looking prettier. Her face was flushed and her eyes aflame. The stout +wraith of Uncle Donald, which had accompanied Mr. Carmyle on this +expedition of his, faded into nothingness as he gazed. + +There was a pause. Mr. Carmyle, having lighted his cigarette, puffed +vigorously. + +"When did you land?" asked Sally, feeling the need of saying something. +Her mind was confused. She could not have said whether she was glad +or sorry that he was there. Glad, she thought, on the whole. There +was something in his dark, cool, stiff English aspect that gave her a +curious feeling of relief. He was so unlike Mr. Cracknell and the man +from up-state and so calmly remote from the feverish atmosphere in which +she lived her nights that it was restful to look at him. + +"I landed to-night," said Bruce Carmyle, turning and faced her squarely. + +"To-night!" + +"We docked at ten." + +He turned away again. He had made his effect, and was content to leave +her to think it over. + +Sally was silent. The significance of his words had not escaped her. She +realized that his presence there was a challenge which she must answer. +And yet it hardly stirred her. She had been fighting so long, and she +felt utterly inert. She was like a swimmer who can battle no longer and +prepares to yield to the numbness of exhaustion. The heat of the room +pressed down on her like a smothering blanket. Her tired nerves cried +out under the blare of music and the clatter of voices. + +"Shall we dance this?" he asked. + +The orchestra had started to play again, a sensuous, creamy melody which +was making the most of its brief reign as Broadway's leading song-hit, +overfamiliar to her from a hundred repetitions. + +"If you like." + +Efficiency was Bruce Carmyle's gospel. He was one of these men who +do not attempt anything which they cannot accomplish to perfection. +Dancing, he had decided early in his life, was a part of a gentleman's +education, and he had seen to it that he was educated thoroughly. Sally, +who, as they swept out on to the floor, had braced herself automatically +for a repetition of the usual bumping struggle which dancing at the +Flower Garden had come to mean for her, found herself in the arms of +a masterful expert, a man who danced better than she did, and suddenly +there came to her a feeling that was almost gratitude, a miraculous +slackening of her taut nerves, a delicious peace. Soothed and contented, +she yielded herself with eyes half closed to the rhythm of the melody, +finding it now robbed in some mysterious manner of all its stale +cheapness, and in that moment her whole attitude towards Bruce Carmyle +underwent a complete change. + +She had never troubled to examine with any minuteness her feelings +towards him: but one thing she had known clearly since their first +meeting--that he was physically distasteful to her. For all his good +looks, and in his rather sinister way he was a handsome man, she had +shrunk from him. Now, spirited away by the magic of the dance, that +repugnance had left her. It was as if some barrier had been broken down +between them. + +"Sally!" + +She felt his arm tighten about her, the muscles quivering. She caught +sight of his face. His dark eyes suddenly blazed into hers and she +stumbled with an odd feeling of helplessness; realizing with a shock +that brought her with a jerk out of the half-dream into which she had +been lulled that this dance had not postponed the moment of decision, +as she had looked to it to do. In a hot whisper, the words swept away +on the flood of the music which had suddenly become raucous and blaring +once more, he was repeating what he had said under the trees at Monk's +Crofton on that far-off morning in the English springtime. Dizzily +she knew that she was resenting the unfairness of the attack at such a +moment, but her mind seemed numbed. + +The music stopped abruptly. Insistent clapping started it again, but +Sally moved away to her table, and he followed her like a shadow. +Neither spoke. Bruce Carmyle had said his say, and Sally was sitting +staring before her, trying to think. She was tired, tired. Her eyes were +burning. She tried to force herself to face the situation squarely. Was +it worth struggling? Was anything in the world worth a struggle? She +only knew that she was tired, desperately tired, tired to the very +depths of her soul. + +The music stopped. There was more clapping, but this time the orchestra +did not respond. Gradually the floor emptied. The shuffling of feet +ceased. The Flower Garden was as quiet as it was ever able to be. Even +the voices of the babblers seemed strangely hushed. Sally closed her +eyes, and as she did so from somewhere up near the roof there came the +song of a bird. + +Isadore Abrahams was a man of his word. He advertised a Flower Garden, +and he had tried to give the public something as closely resembling +a flower-garden as it was possible for an overcrowded, overheated, +overnoisy Broadway dancing-resort to achieve. Paper roses festooned the +walls; genuine tulips bloomed in tubs by every pillar; and from the +roof hung cages with birds in them. One of these, stirred by the sudden +cessation of the tumult below, had began to sing. + +Sally had often pitied these birds, and more than once had pleaded in +vain with Abrahams for a remission of their sentence, but somehow at +this moment it did not occur to her that this one was merely praying in +its own language, as she often had prayed in her thoughts, to be taken +out of this place. To her, sitting there wrestling with Fate, the song +seemed cheerful. It soothed her. It healed her to listen to it. And +suddenly before her eyes there rose a vision of Monk's Crofton, cool, +green, and peaceful under the mild English sun, luring her as an oasis +seen in the distance lures the desert traveller... + +She became aware that the master of Monk's Crofton had placed his hand +on hers and was holding it in a tightening grip. She looked down and +gave a little shiver. She had always disliked Bruce Carmyle's hands. +They were strong and bony and black hair grew on the back of them. One +of the earliest feelings regarding him had been that she would hate to +have those hands touching her. But she did not move. Again that vision +of the old garden had flickered across her mind... a haven where she +could rest... + +He was leaning towards her, whispering in her ear. The room was hotter +than it had ever been, noisier than it had ever been, fuller than it had +ever been. The bird on the roof was singing again and now she understood +what it said. "Take me out of this!" Did anything matter except that? +What did it matter how one was taken, or where, or by whom, so that one +was taken. + +Monk's Crofton was looking cool and green and peaceful... + +"Very well," said Sally. + +3 + + + +Bruce Carmyle, in the capacity of accepted suitor, found himself at +something of a loss. He had a dissatisfied feeling. It was not the +manner of Sally's acceptance that caused this. It would, of course, have +pleased him better if she had shown more warmth, but he was prepared to +wait for warmth. What did trouble him was the fact that his correct mind +perceived now for the first time that he had chosen an unsuitable moment +and place for his outburst of emotion. He belonged to the orthodox +school of thought which looks on moonlight and solitude as the proper +setting for a proposal of marriage; and the surroundings of the Flower +Garden, for all its nice-ness and the nice manner in which it was +conducted, jarred upon him profoundly. + +Music had begun again, but it was not the soft music such as a lover +demands if he is to give of his best. It was a brassy, clashy rendering +of a ribald one-step, enough to choke the eloquence of the most ardent. +Couples were dipping and swaying and bumping into one another as far +as the eye could reach; while just behind him two waiters had halted in +order to thrash out one of those voluble arguments in which waiters +love to indulge. To continue the scene at the proper emotional level +was impossible, and Bruce Carmyle began his career as an engaged man by +dropping into Smalltalk. + +"Deuce of a lot of noise," he said querulously. + +"Yes," agreed Sally. + +"Is it always like this?" + +"Oh, yes." + +"Infernal racket!" + +"Yes." + +The romantic side of Mr. Carmyle's nature could have cried aloud at the +hideous unworthiness of these banalities. In the visions which he had +had of himself as a successful wooer, it had always been in the moments +immediately succeeding the all-important question and its whispered +reply that he had come out particularly strong. He had been accustomed +to picture himself bending with a proud tenderness over his partner in +the scene and murmuring some notably good things to her bowed head. How +could any man murmur in a pandemonium like this. From tenderness Bruce +Carmyle descended with a sharp swoop to irritability. + +"Do you often come here?" + +"Yes." + +"What for?" + +"To dance." + +Mr. Carmyle chafed helplessly. The scene, which should be so romantic, +had suddenly reminded him of the occasion when, at the age of twenty, he +had attended his first ball and had sat in a corner behind a potted palm +perspiring shyly and endeavouring to make conversation to a formidable +nymph in pink. It was one of the few occasions in his life at which he +had ever been at a complete disadvantage. He could still remember the +clammy discomfort of his too high collar as it melted on him. Most +certainly it was not a scene which he enjoyed recalling; and that +he should be forced to recall it now, at what ought to have been the +supreme moment of his life, annoyed him intensely. Almost angrily he +endeavoured to jerk the conversation to a higher level. + +"Darling," he murmured, for by moving his chair two feet to the right +and bending sideways he found that he was in a position to murmur, "you +have made me so..." + +"Batti, batti! I presto ravioli hollandaise," cried one of the disputing +waiters at his back--or to Bruce Carmyle's prejudiced hearing it sounded +like that. + +"La Donna e mobile spaghetti napoli Tettrazina," rejoined the second +waiter with spirit. + +"... you have made me so..." + +"Infanta Isabella lope de Vegas mulligatawny Toronto," said the first +waiter, weak but coming back pluckily. + +"... so happy..." + +"Funiculi funicula Vincente y Blasco Ibanez vermicelli sul campo della +gloria risotto!" said the second waiter clinchingly, and scored a +technical knockout. + +Bruce Carmyle gave it up, and lit a moody cigarette. He was oppressed by +that feeling which so many of us have felt in our time, that it was all +wrong. + +The music stopped. The two leading citizens of Little Italy vanished and +went their way, probably to start a vendetta. There followed comparative +calm. But Bruce Carmyle's emotions, like sweet bells jangled, were out +of tune, and he could not recapture the first fine careless rapture. He +found nothing within him but small-talk. + +"What has become of your party?" he asked. + +"My party?" + +"The people you are with," said Mr. Carmyle. Even in the stress of his +emotion this problem had been exercising him. In his correctly ordered +world girls did not go to restaurants alone. + +"I'm not with anybody." + +"You came here by yourself?" exclaimed Bruce Carmyle, frankly aghast. +And, as he spoke, the wraith of Uncle Donald, banished till now, +returned as large as ever, puffing disapproval through a walrus +moustache. + +"I am employed here," said Sally. + +Mr. Carmyle started violently. + +"Employed here?" + +"As a dancer, you know. I..." + +Sally broke off, her attention abruptly diverted to something which +had just caught her eye at a table on the other side of the room. +That something was a red-headed young man of sturdy build who had just +appeared beside the chair in which Mr. Reginald Cracknell was sitting +in huddled gloom. In one hand he carried a basket, and from this basket, +rising above the din of conversation, there came a sudden sharp yapping. +Mr. Cracknell roused himself from his stupor, took the basket, raised +the lid. The yapping increased in volume. + +Mr. Cracknell rose, the basket in his arms. With uncertain steps and a +look on his face like that of those who lead forlorn hopes he crossed +the floor to where Miss Mabel Hobson sat, proud and aloof. The next +moment that haughty lady, the centre of an admiring and curious +crowd, was hugging to her bosom a protesting Pekingese puppy, and Mr. +Cracknell, seizing his opportunity like a good general, had deposited +himself in a chair at her side. The course of true love was running +smooth again. + +The red-headed young man was gazing fixedly at Sally. + +"As a dancer!" ejaculated Mr. Carmyle. Of all those within sight of the +moving drama which had just taken place, he alone had paid no attention +to it. Replete as it was with human interest, sex-appeal, the punch, and +all the other qualities which a drama should possess, it had failed to +grip him. His thoughts had been elsewhere. The accusing figure of Uncle +Donald refused to vanish from his mental eye. The stern voice of Uncle +Donald seemed still to ring in his ear. + +A dancer! A professional dancer at a Broadway restaurant! Hideous doubts +began to creep like snakes into Bruce Carmyle's mind. What, he asked +himself, did he really know of this girl on whom he had bestowed the +priceless boon of his society for life? How did he know what she was--he +could not find the exact adjective to express his meaning, but he knew +what he meant. Was she worthy of the boon? That was what it amounted +to. All his life he had had a prim shrinking from the section of the +feminine world which is connected with the light-life of large cities. +Club acquaintances of his in London had from time to time married into +the Gaiety Chorus, and Mr. Carmyle, though he had no objection to +the Gaiety Chorus in its proper place--on the other side of the +footlights--had always looked on these young men after as social +outcasts. The fine dashing frenzy which had brought him all the way from +South Audley Street to win Sally was ebbing fast. + +Sally, hearing him speak, had turned. And there was a candid honesty +in her gaze which for a moment sent all those creeping doubts scuttling +away into the darkness whence they had come. He had not made a fool of +himself, he protested to the lowering phantom of Uncle Donald. Who, he +demanded, could look at Sally and think for an instant that she was not +all that was perfect and lovable? A warm revulsion of feeling swept over +Bruce Carmyle like a returning tide. + +"You see, I lost my money and had to do something," said Sally. + +"I see, I see," murmured Mr. Carmyle; and if only Fate had left him +alone who knows to what heights of tenderness he might not have soared? +But at this moment Fate, being no respecter of persons, sent into his +life the disturbing personality of George Washington Williams. + +George Washington Williams was the talented coloured gentleman who +had been extracted from small-time vaudeville by Mr. Abrahams to do +a nightly speciality at the Flower Garden. He was, in fact, a +trap-drummer: and it was his amiable practice, after he had done a few +minutes trap-drumming, to rise from his seat and make a circular tour of +the tables on the edge of the dancing-floor, whimsically pretending +to clip the locks of the male patrons with a pair of drumsticks held +scissor-wise. And so it came about that, just as Mr. Carmyle was bending +towards Sally in an access of manly sentiment, and was on the very verge +of pouring out his soul in a series of well-phrased remarks, he was +surprised and annoyed to find an Ethiopian to whom he had never been +introduced leaning over him and taking quite unpardonable liberties with +his back hair. + +One says that Mr. Carmyle was annoyed. The word is weak. The +interruption coming at such a moment jarred every ganglion in his body. +The clicking noise of the drumsticks maddened him. And the gleaming +whiteness of Mr. Williams' friendly and benignant smile was the last +straw. His dignity writhed beneath this abominable infliction. People +at other tables were laughing. At him. A loathing for the Flower Garden +flowed over Bruce Carmyle, and with it a feeling of suspicion and +disapproval of everyone connected with the establishment. He sprang to +his feet. + +"I think I will be going," he said. + +Sally did not reply. She was watching Ginger, who still stood beside the +table recently vacated by Reginald Cracknell. + +"Good night," said Mr. Carmyle between his teeth. + +"Oh, are you going?" said Sally with a start. She felt embarrassed. Try +as she would, she was unable to find words of any intimacy. She tried to +realize that she had promised to marry this man, but never before had he +seemed so much a stranger to her, so little a part of her life. It came +to her with a sensation of the incredible that she had done this thing, +taken this irrevocable step. + +The sudden sight of Ginger had shaken her. It was as though in the last +half-hour she had forgotten him and only now realized what marriage with +Bruce Carmyle would mean to their comradeship. From now on he was dead +to her. If anything in this world was certain that was. Sally Nicholas +was Ginger's pal, but Mrs. Carmyle, she realized, would never be allowed +to see him again. A devastating feeling of loss smote her like a blow. + +"Yes, I've had enough of this place," Bruce Carmyle was saying. + +"Good night," said Sally. She hesitated. "When shall I see you?" she +asked awkwardly. + +It occurred to Bruce Carmyle that he was not showing himself at his +best. He had, he perceived, allowed his nerves to run away with him. + +"You don't mind if I go?" he said more amiably. "The fact is, I can't +stand this place any longer. I'll tell you one thing, I'm going to take +you out of here quick." + +"I'm afraid I can't leave at a moment's notice," said Sally, loyal to +her obligations. + +"We'll talk over that to-morrow. I'll call for you in the morning and +take you for a drive somewhere in a car. You want some fresh air after +this." Mr. Carmyle looked about him in stiff disgust, and expressed +his unalterable sentiments concerning the Flower Garden, that apple of +Isadore Abrahams' eye, in a snort of loathing. "My God! What a place!" + +He walked quickly away and disappeared. And Ginger, beaming happily, +swooped on Sally's table like a homing pigeon. + + + +4 + + + +"Good Lord, I say, what ho!" cried Ginger. "Fancy meeting you here. What +a bit of luck!" He glanced over his shoulder warily. "Has that blighter +pipped?" + +"Pipped?" + +"Popped," explained Ginger. "I mean to say, he isn't coming back or any +rot like that, is he?" + +"Mr. Carmyle? No, he has gone." + +"Sound egg!" said Ginger with satisfaction. "For a moment, when I saw +you yarning away together, I thought he might be with your party. What +on earth is he doing over here at all, confound him? He's got all Europe +to play about in, why should he come infesting New York? I say, it +really is ripping, seeing you again. It seems years... Of course, one +get's a certain amount of satisfaction writing letters, but it's not the +same. Besides, I write such rotten letters. I say, this really is rather +priceless. Can't I get you something? A cup of coffee, I mean, or an egg +or something? By jove! this really is top-hole." + +His homely, honest face glowed with pleasure, and it seemed to Sally as +though she had come out of a winter's night into a warm friendly room. +Her mercurial spirits soared. + +"Oh, Ginger! If you knew what it's like seeing you!" + +"No, really? Do you mean, honestly, you're braced?" + +"I should say I am braced." + +"Well, isn't that fine! I was afraid you might have forgotten me." + +"Forgotten you!" + +With something of the effect of a revelation it suddenly struck Sally +how far she had been from forgetting him, how large was the place he had +occupied in her thoughts. + +"I've missed you dreadfully," she said, and felt the words inadequate as +she uttered them. + +"What ho!" said Ginger, also internally condemning the poverty of speech +as a vehicle for conveying thought. + +There was a brief silence. The first exhilaration of the reunion over, +Sally deep down in her heart was aware of a troubled feeling as though +the world were out of joint. She forced herself to ignore it, but it +would not be ignored. It grew. Dimly she was beginning to realize what +Ginger meant to her, and she fought to keep herself from realizing it. +Strange things were happening to her to-night, strange emotions stirring +her. Ginger seemed somehow different, as if she were really seeing him +for the first time. + +"You're looking wonderfully well," she said trying to keep the +conversation on a pedestrian level. + +"I am well," said Ginger. "Never felt fitter in my life. Been out in the +open all day long... simple life and all that... working like blazes. +I say, business is booming. Did you see me just now, handing over Percy +the Pup to what's-his-name? Five hundred dollars on that one deal. Got +the cheque in my pocket. But what an extraordinarily rummy thing that +I should have come to this place to deliver the goods just when you +happened to be here. I couldn't believe my eyes at first. I say, I +hope the people you're with won't think I'm butting in. You'll have to +explain that we're old pals and that you started me in business and all +that sort of thing. Look here," he said lowering his voice, "I know +how you hate being thanked, but I simply must say how terrifically +decent..." + +"Miss Nicholas." + +Lee Schoenstein was standing at the table, and by his side an expectant +youth with a small moustache and pince-nez. Sally got up, and the next +moment Ginger was alone, gaping perplexedly after her as she vanished +and reappeared in the jogging throng on the dancing floor. It was the +nearest thing Ginger had seen to a conjuring trick, and at that moment +he was ill-attuned to conjuring tricks. He brooded, fuming, at what +seemed to him the supremest exhibition of pure cheek, of monumental +nerve, and of undiluted crust that had ever come within his notice. To +come and charge into a private conversation like that and whisk her away +without a word... + +"Who was that blighter?" he demanded with heat, when the music ceased +and Sally limped back. + +"That was Mr. Schoenstein." + +"And who was the other?" + +"The one I danced with? I don't know." + +"You don't know?" + +Sally perceived that the conversation had arrived at an embarrassing +point. There was nothing for it but candour. + +"Ginger," she said, "you remember my telling you when we first met that +I used to dance in a Broadway place? This is the place. I'm working +again." + +Complete unintelligence showed itself on Ginger's every feature. + +"I don't understand," he said--unnecessarily, for his face revealed the +fact. + +"I've got my old job back." + +"But why?" + +"Well, I had to do something." She went on rapidly. Already a light +dimly resembling the light of understanding was beginning to appear in +Ginger's eyes. "Fillmore went smash, you know--it wasn't his fault, poor +dear. He had the worst kind of luck--and most of my money was tied up in +his business, so you see..." + +She broke off confused by the look in his eyes, conscious of an absurd +feeling of guilt. There was amazement in that look and a sort of +incredulous horror. + +"Do you mean to say..." Ginger gulped and started again. "Do you mean +to tell me that you let me have... all that money... for the +dog-business... when you were broke? Do you mean to say..." + +Sally stole a glance at his crimson face and looked away again quickly. +There was an electric silence. + +"Look here," exploded Ginger with sudden violence, "you've got to marry +me. You've jolly well got to marry me! I don't mean that," he added +quickly. "I mean to say I know you're going to marry whoever you +please... but won't you marry me? Sally, for God's sake have a dash +at it! I've been keeping it in all this time because it seemed rather +rotten to bother you about it, but now....Oh, dammit, I wish I could put +it into words. I always was rotten at talking. But... well, look here, +what I mean is, I know I'm not much of a chap, but it seems to me you +must care for me a bit to do a thing like that for a fellow... and... +I've loved you like the dickens ever since I met you... I do wish you'd +have a stab at it, Sally. At least I could look after you, you know, +and all that... I mean to say, work like the deuce and try to give you a +good time... I'm not such an ass as to think a girl like you could ever +really... er... love a blighter like me, but..." + +Sally laid her hand on his. + +"Ginger, dear," she said, "I do love you. I ought to have known it all +along, but I seem to be understanding myself to-night for the first +time." She got up and bent over him for a swift moment, whispering in +his ear, "I shall never love anyone but you, Ginger. Will you try +to remember that." She was moving away, but he caught at her arm and +stopped her. + +"Sally..." + +She pulled her arm away, her face working as she fought against the +tears that would not keep back. + +"I've made a fool of myself," she said. "Ginger, your cousin... Mr. +Carmyle... just now he asked me to marry him, and I said I would." + +She was gone, flitting among the tables like some wild creature running +to its home: and Ginger, motionless, watched her go. + + + +5 + + + +The telephone-bell in Sally's little sitting-room was ringing jerkily +as she let herself in at the front door. She guessed who it was at the +other end of the wire, and the noise of the bell sounded to her like the +voice of a friend in distress crying for help. Without stopping to +close the door, she ran to the table and unhooked the receiver. Muffled, +plaintive sounds were coming over the wire. + +"Hullo... Hullo... I say... Hullo..." + +"Hullo, Ginger," said Sally quietly. + +An ejaculation that was half a shout and half gurgle answered her. + +"Sally! Is that you?" + +"Yes, here I am, Ginger." + +"I've been trying to get you for ages." + +"I've only just come in. I walked home." + +There was a pause. + +"Hullo." + +"Yes?" + +"Well, I mean..." Ginger seemed to be finding his usual difficulty in +expressing himself. "About that, you know. What you said." + +"Yes?" said Sally, trying to keep her voice from shaking. + +"You said..." Again Ginger's vocabulary failed him. "You said you loved +me." + +"Yes," said Sally simply. + +Another odd sound floated over the wire, and there was a moment of +silence before Ginger found himself able to resume. + +"I... I... Well, we can talk about that when we meet. I mean, it's no +good trying to say what I think over the 'phone, I'm sort of knocked +out. I never dreamed... But, I say, what did you mean about Bruce?" + +"I told you, I told you." Sally's face was twisted and the receiver +shook in her hand. "I've made a fool of myself. I never realized... And +now it's too late." + +"Good God!" Ginger's voice rose in a sharp wail. "You can't mean you +really... You don't seriously intend to marry the man?" + +"I must. I've promised." + +"But, good heavens..." + +"It's no good. I must." + +"But the man's a blighter!" + +"I can't break my word." + +"I never heard such rot," said Ginger vehemently. "Of course you can. A +girl isn't expected..." + +"I can't, Ginger dear, I really can't." + +"But look here..." + +"It's really no good talking about it any more, really it isn't... Where +are you staying to-night?" + +"Staying? Me? At the Plaza. But look here..." + +Sally found herself laughing weakly. + +"At the Plaza! Oh, Ginger, you really do want somebody to look after +you. Squandering your pennies like that... Well, don't talk any more +now. It's so late and I'm so tired. I'll come and see you to-morrow. +Good night." + +She hung up the receiver quickly, to cut short a fresh outburst of +protest. And as she turned away a voice spoke behind her. + +"Sally!" + +Gerald Foster was standing in the doorway. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII. SALLY LAYS A GHOST + + + +1 + + + +The blood flowed slowly back into Sally's face, and her heart, which +had leaped madly for an instant at the sound of his voice, resumed its +normal beat. The suddenness of the shock over, she was surprised to +find herself perfectly calm. Always when she had imagined this meeting, +knowing that it would have to take place sooner or later, she had felt +something akin to panic: but now that it had actually occurred it hardly +seemed to stir her. The events of the night had left her incapable of +any violent emotion. + +"Hullo, Sally!" said Gerald. + +He spoke thickly, and there was a foolish smile on his face as he +stood swaying with one hand on the door. He was in his shirt-sleeves, +collarless: and it was plain that he had been drinking heavily. His face +was white and puffy, and about him there hung like a nimbus a sodden +disreputableness. + +Sally did not speak. Weighed down before by a numbing exhaustion, she +seemed now to have passed into that second phase in which over-tired +nerves enter upon a sort of Indian summer of abnormal alertness. She +looked at him quietly, coolly and altogether dispassionately, as if he +had been a stranger. + +"Hullo!" said Gerald again. + +"What do you want?" said Sally. + +"Heard your voice. Saw the door open. Thought I'd come in." + +"What do you want?" + +The weak smile which had seemed pinned on Gerald's face vanished. A tear +rolled down his cheek. His intoxication had reached the maudlin stage. + +"Sally... S-Sally... I'm very miserable." He slurred awkwardly over the +difficult syllables. "Heard your voice. Saw the door open. Thought I'd +come in." + +Something flicked at the back of Sally's mind. She seemed to have +been through all this before. Then she remembered. This was simply Mr. +Reginald Cracknell over again. + +"I think you had better go to bed, Gerald," she said steadily. Nothing +about him seemed to touch her now, neither the sight of him nor his +shameless misery. + +"What's the use? Can't sleep. No good. Couldn't sleep. Sally, you don't +know how worried I am. I see what a fool I've been." + +Sally made a quick gesture, to check what she supposed was about +to develop into a belated expression of regret for his treatment of +herself. She did not want to stand there listening to Gerald apologizing +with tears for having done his best to wreck her life. But it seemed +that it was not this that was weighing upon his soul. + +"I was a fool ever to try writing plays," he went on. "Got a winner +first time, but can't repeat. It's no good. Ought to have stuck to +newspaper work. I'm good at that. Shall have to go back to it. Had +another frost to-night. No good trying any more. Shall have to go back +to the old grind, damn it." + +He wept softly, full of pity for his hard case. + +"Very miserable," he murmured. + +He came forward a step into the room, lurched, and retreated to the safe +support of the door. For an instant Sally's artificial calm was shot +through by a swift stab of contempt. It passed, and she was back again +in her armour of indifference. + +"Go to bed, Gerald," she said. "You'll feel better in the morning." + +Perhaps some inkling of how he was going to feel in the morning worked +through to Gerald's muddled intelligence, for he winced, and his manner +took on a deeper melancholy. + +"May not be alive in the morning," he said solemnly. "Good mind to +end it all. End it all!" he repeated with the beginning of a sweeping +gesture which was cut off abruptly as he clutched at the friendly door. + +Sally was not in the mood for melodrama. + +"Oh, go to bed," she said impatiently. The strange frozen indifference +which had gripped her was beginning to pass, leaving in its place a +growing feeling of resentment--resentment against Gerald for degrading +himself like this, against herself for ever having found glamour in the +man. It humiliated her to remember how utterly she had once allowed his +personality to master hers. And under the sting of this humiliation she +felt hard and pitiless. Dimly she was aware that a curious change had +come over her to-night. Normally, the sight of any living thing in +distress was enough to stir her quick sympathy: but Gerald mourning +over the prospect of having to go back to regular work made no appeal to +her--a fact which the sufferer noted and commented upon. + +"You're very unsymp... unsympathetic," he complained. + +"I'm sorry," said Sally. She walked briskly to the door and gave it a +push. Gerald, still clinging to his chosen support, moved out into the +passage, attached to the handle, with the air of a man the foundations +of whose world have suddenly lost their stability. He released the +handle and moved uncertainly across the passage. Finding his own door +open before him, he staggered over the threshold; and Sally, having +watched him safely to his journey's end, went into her bedroom with the +intention of terminating this disturbing night by going to sleep. + +Almost immediately she changed her mind. Sleep was out of the question. +A fever of restlessness had come upon her. She put on a kimono, and +went into the kitchen to ascertain whether her commissariat arrangements +would permit of a glass of hot milk. + +She had just remembered that she had that morning presented the last +of the milk to a sandy cat with a purposeful eye which had dropped in +through the window to take breakfast with her, when her regrets for this +thriftless hospitality were interrupted by a muffled crash. + +She listened intently. The sound had seemed to come from across the +passage. She hurried to the door and opened it. As she did so, from +behind the door of the apartment opposite there came a perfect fusillade +of crashes, each seeming to her strained hearing louder and more +appalling than the last. + +There is something about sudden, loud noises in the stillness of the +night which shatters the most rigid detachment. A short while before, +Gerald, toying with the idea of ending his sorrows by violence, had +left Sally unmoved: but now her mind leapt back to what he had said, +and apprehension succeeded indifference. There was no disputing the fact +that Gerald was in an irresponsible mood, under the influence of +which he was capable of doing almost anything. Sally, listening in the +doorway, felt a momentary panic. + +A brief silence had succeeded the fusillade, but, as she stood there +hesitating, the noise broke out again; and this time it was so loud and +compelling that Sally hesitated no longer. She ran across the passage +and beat on the door. + + + +2 + + + +Whatever devastating happenings had been going on in his home, it was +plain a moment later that Gerald had managed to survive them: for there +came the sound of a dragging footstep, and the door opened. Gerald stood +on the threshold, the weak smile back on his face. + +"Hullo, Sally!" + +At the sight of him, disreputable and obviously unscathed, Sally's +brief alarm died away, leaving in its place the old feeling of impatient +resentment. In addition to her other grievances against him, he had +apparently frightened her unnecessarily. + +"Whatever was all that noise?" she demanded. + +"Noise?" said Gerald, considering the point open-mouthed. + +"Yes, noise," snapped Sally. + +"I've been cleaning house," said Gerald with the owl-like gravity of a +man just conscious that he is not wholly himself. + +Sally pushed her way past him. The apartment in which she found herself +was almost an exact replica of her own, and it was evident that Elsa +Doland had taken pains to make it pretty and comfortable in a niggly +feminine way. Amateur interior decoration had always been a hobby +of hers. Even in the unpromising surroundings of her bedroom at +Mrs. Meecher's boarding-house she had contrived to create a certain +daintiness which Sally, who had no ability in that direction herself, +had always rather envied. As a decorator Elsa's mind ran in the +direction of small, fragile ornaments, and she was not afraid of +over-furnishing. Pictures jostled one another on the walls: china of all +description stood about on little tables: there was a profusion of lamps +with shades of parti-coloured glass: and plates were ranged along a +series of shelves. + +One says that the plates were ranged and the pictures jostled one +another, but it would be more correct to put it they had jostled and +had been ranged, for it was only by guess-work that Sally was able +to reconstruct the scene as it must have appeared before Gerald had +started, as he put it, to clean house. She had walked into the flat +briskly enough, but she pulled up short as she crossed the threshold, +appalled by the majestic ruin that met her gaze. A shell bursting in the +little sitting-room could hardly have created more havoc. + +The psychology of a man of weak character under the influence of alcohol +and disappointed ambition is not easy to plumb, for his moods follow one +another with a rapidity which baffles the observer. Ten minutes before, +Gerald Foster had been in the grip of a clammy self-pity, and it seemed +from his aspect at the present moment that this phase had returned. But +in the interval there had manifestly occurred a brief but adequate +spasm of what would appear to have been an almost Berserk fury. What had +caused it and why it should have expended itself so abruptly, Sally was +not psychologist enough to explain; but that it had existed there was +ocular evidence of the most convincing kind. A heavy niblick, flung +petulantly--or remorsefully--into a corner, showed by what medium the +destruction had been accomplished. + +Bleak chaos appeared on every side. The floor was littered with every +imaginable shape and size of broken glass and china. Fragments of +pictures, looking as if they had been chewed by some prehistoric animal, +lay amid heaps of shattered statuettes and vases. As Sally moved slowly +into the room after her involuntary pause, china crackled beneath her +feet. She surveyed the stripped walls with a wondering eye, and turned +to Gerald for an explanation. + +Gerald had subsided on to an occasional table, and was weeping softly +again. It had come over him once more that he had been very, very badly +treated. + +"Well!" said Sally with a gasp. "You've certainly made a good job of +it!" + +There was a sharp crack as the occasional table, never designed by its +maker to bear heavy weights, gave way in a splintering flurry of broken +legs under the pressure of the master of the house: and Sally's mood +underwent an abrupt change. There are few situations in life which do +not hold equal potentialities for both tragedy and farce, and it was +the ludicrous side of this drama that chanced to appeal to Sally at +this moment. Her sense of humour was tickled. It was, if she could have +analysed her feelings, at herself that she was mocking--at the feeble +sentimental Sally who had once conceived the absurd idea of taking this +preposterous man seriously. She felt light-hearted and light-headed, and +she sank into a chair with a gurgling laugh. + +The shock of his fall appeared to have had the desirable effect of +restoring Gerald to something approaching intelligence. He picked +himself up from the remains of a set of water-colours, gazing at Sally +with growing disapproval. + +"No sympathy," he said austerely. + +"I can't help it," cried Sally. "It's too funny." + +"Not funny," corrected Gerald, his brain beginning to cloud once more. + +"What did you do it for?" + +Gerald returned for a moment to that mood of honest indignation, which +had so strengthened his arm when wielding the niblick. He bethought him +once again of his grievance. + +"Wasn't going to stand for it any longer," he said heatedly. "A fellow's +wife goes and lets him down... ruins his show by going off and playing +in another show... why shouldn't I smash her things? Why should I stand +for that sort of treatment? Why should I?" + +"Well, you haven't," said Sally, "so there's no need to discuss it. You +seem to have acted in a thoroughly manly and independent way." + +"That's it. Manly independent." He waggled his finger impressively. +"Don't care what she says," he continued. "Don't care if she never comes +back. That woman..." + +Sally was not prepared to embark with him upon a discussion of the +absent Elsa. Already the amusing aspect of the affair had begun to fade, +and her hilarity was giving way to a tired distaste for the sordidness +of the whole business. She had become aware that she could not +endure the society of Gerald Foster much longer. She got up and spoke +decidedly. + +"And now," she said, "I'm going to tidy up." + +Gerald had other views. + +"No," he said with sudden solemnity. "No! Nothing of the kind. Leave it +for her to find. Leave it as it is." + +"Don't be silly. All this has got to be cleaned up. I'll do it. You go +and sit in my apartment. I'll come and tell you when you can come back." + +"No!" said Gerald, wagging his head. + +Sally stamped her foot among the crackling ruins. Quite suddenly the +sight of him had become intolerable. + +"Do as I tell you," she cried. + +Gerald wavered for a moment, but his brief militant mood was ebbing +fast. After a faint protest he shuffled off, and Sally heard him go into +her room. She breathed a deep breath of relief and turned to her task. + +A visit to the kitchen revealed a long-handled broom, and, armed with +this, Sally was soon busy. She was an efficient little person, and +presently out of chaos there began to emerge a certain order. Nothing +short of complete re-decoration would ever make the place look habitable +again, but at the end of half an hour she had cleared the floor, and +the fragments of vases, plates, lamp-shades, pictures and glasses were +stacked in tiny heaps against the walls. She returned the broom to the +kitchen, and, going back into the sitting-room, flung open the window +and stood looking out. + +With a sense of unreality she perceived that the night had gone. Over +the quiet street below there brooded that strange, metallic light which +ushers in the dawn of a fine day. A cold breeze whispered to and fro. +Above the house-tops the sky was a faint, level blue. + +She left the window and started to cross the room. And suddenly there +came over her a feeling of utter weakness. She stumbled to a chair, +conscious only of being tired beyond the possibility of a further +effort. Her eyes closed, and almost before her head had touched the +cushions she was asleep. + + + +3 + + + +Sally woke. Sunshine was streaming through the open window, and with +it the myriad noises of a city awake and about its business. Footsteps +clattered on the sidewalk, automobile horns were sounding, and she could +hear the clank of street cars as they passed over the points. She could +only guess at the hour, but it was evident that the morning was well +advanced. She got up stiffly. Her head was aching. + +She went into the bathroom, bathed her face, and felt better. The dull +oppression which comes of a bad night was leaving her. She leaned out +of the window, revelling in the fresh air, then crossed the passage and +entered her own apartment. Stertorous breathing greeted her, and she +perceived that Gerald Foster had also passed the night in a chair. He +was sprawling by the window with his legs stretched out and his head +resting on one of the arms, an unlovely spectacle. + +Sally stood regarding him for a moment with a return of the distaste +which she had felt on the previous night. And yet, mingled with the +distaste, there was a certain elation. A black chapter of her life was +closed for ever. Whatever the years to come might bring to her, they +would be free from any wistful yearnings for the man who had once been +woven so inextricably into the fabric of her life. She had thought that +his personality had gripped her too strongly ever to be dislodged, +but now she could look at him calmly and feel only a faint half-pity, +half-contempt. The glamour had departed. + +She shook him gently, and he sat up with a start, blinking in the strong +light. His mouth was still open. He stared at Sally foolishly, then +scrambled awkwardly out of the chair. + +"Oh, my God!" said Gerald, pressing both his hands to his forehead and +sitting down again. He licked his lips with a dry tongue and moaned. +"Oh, I've got a headache!" + +Sally might have pointed out to him that he had certainly earned one, +but she refrained. + +"You'd better go and have a wash," she suggested. + +"Yes," said Gerald, heaving himself up again. + +"Would you like some breakfast?" + +"Don't!" said Gerald faintly, and tottered off to the bathroom. + +Sally sat down in the chair he had vacated. She had never felt quite +like this before in her life. Everything seemed dreamlike. The splashing +of water in the bathroom came faintly to her, and she realized that she +had been on the point of falling asleep again. She got up and opened the +window, and once more the air acted as a restorative. She watched the +activities of the street with a distant interest. They, too, seemed +dreamlike and unreal. People were hurrying up and down on mysterious +errands. An inscrutable cat picked its way daintily across the road. At +the door of the apartment house an open car purred sleepily. + +She was roused by a ring at the bell. She went to the door and opened +it, and found Bruce Carmyle standing on the threshold. He wore a light +motor-coat, and he was plainly endeavouring to soften the severity of +his saturnine face with a smile of beaming kindliness. + +"Well, here I am!" said Bruce Carmyle cheerily. "Are you ready?" + +With the coming of daylight a certain penitence had descended on Mr. +Carmyle. Thinking things over while shaving and subsequently in his +bath, he had come to the conclusion that his behaviour overnight had not +been all that could have been desired. He had not actually been brutal, +perhaps, but he had undoubtedly not been winning. There had been an +abruptness in the manner of his leaving Sally at the Flower Garden which +a perfect lover ought not to have shown. He had allowed his nerves +to get the better of him, and now he desired to make amends. Hence a +cheerfulness which he did not usually exhibit so early in the morning. + +Sally was staring at him blankly. She had completely forgotten that he +had said that he would come and take her for a drive this morning. She +searched in her mind for words, and found none. And, as Mr. Carmyle +was debating within himself whether to kiss her now or wait for a more +suitable moment, embarrassment came upon them both like a fog, and the +genial smile faded from his face as if the motive-power behind it had +suddenly failed. + +"I've--er--got the car outside, and..." + +At this point speech failed Mr. Carmyle, for, even as he began the +sentence, the door that led to the bathroom opened and Gerald Foster +came out. Mr. Carmyle gaped at Gerald: Gerald gaped at Mr. Carmyle. + +The application of cold water to the face and head is an excellent thing +on the morning after an imprudent night, but as a tonic it only goes +part of the way. In the case of Gerald Foster, which was an extremely +serious and aggravated case, it had gone hardly any way at all. The +person unknown who had been driving red-hot rivets into the base of +Gerald Foster's skull ever since the moment of his awakening was still +busily engaged on that task. He gazed at Mr. Carmyle wanly. + +Bruce Carmyle drew in his breath with a sharp hiss, and stood rigid. His +eyes, burning now with a grim light, flickered over Gerald's person +and found nothing in it to entertain them. He saw a slouching figure +in shirt-sleeves and the foundations of evening dress, a disgusting, +degraded figure with pink eyes and a white face that needed a shave. And +all the doubts that had ever come to vex Mr. Carmyle's mind since his +first meeting with Sally became on the instant certainties. So Uncle +Donald had been right after all! This was the sort of girl she was! + +At his elbow the stout phantom of Uncle Donald puffed with satisfaction. + +"I told you so!" it said. + +Sally had not moved. The situation was beyond her. Just as if this had +really been the dream it seemed, she felt incapable of speech or action. + +"So..." said Mr. Carmyle, becoming articulate, and allowed an impressive +aposiopesis to take the place of the rest of the speech. A cold fury +had gripped him. He pointed at Gerald, began to speak, found that he was +stuttering, and gulped back the words. In this supreme moment he was not +going to have his dignity impaired by a stutter. He gulped and found a +sentence which, while brief enough to insure against this disaster, was +sufficiently long to express his meaning. + +"Get out!" he said. + +Gerald Foster had his dignity, too, and it seemed to him that the time +had come to assert it. But he also had a most excruciating headache, and +when he drew himself up haughtily to ask Mr. Carmyle what the devil he +meant by it, a severe access of pain sent him huddling back immediately +to a safer attitude. He clasped his forehead and groaned. + +"Get out!" + +For a moment Gerald hesitated. Then another sudden shooting spasm +convinced him that no profit or pleasure was to be derived from a +continuance of the argument, and he began to shamble slowly across to +the door. Bruce Carmyle watched him go with twitching hands. There was +a moment when the human man in him, somewhat atrophied from long disuse, +stirred him almost to the point of assault; then dignity whispered more +prudent counsel in his ear, and Gerald was past the danger-zone and out +in the passage. Mr. Carmyle turned to face Sally, as King Arthur on +a similar but less impressive occasion must have turned to deal with +Guinevere. + +"So..." he said again. + +Sally was eyeing him steadily--considering the circumstances, Mr. +Carmyle thought with not a little indignation, much too steadily. + +"This," he said ponderously, "is very amusing." + +He waited for her to speak, but she said nothing. + +"I might have expected it," said Mr. Carmyle with a bitter laugh. + +Sally forced herself from the lethargy which was gripping her. + +"Would you like me to explain?" she said. + +"There can be no explanation," said Mr. Carmyle coldly. + +"Very well," said Sally. + +There was a pause. + +"Good-bye," said Bruce Carmyle. + +"Good-bye," said Sally. + +Mr. Carmyle walked to the door. There he stopped for an instant and +glanced back at her. Sally had walked to the window and was looking out. +For one swift instant something about her trim little figure and the +gleam of her hair where the sunlight shone on it seemed to catch at +Bruce Carmyle's heart, and he wavered. But the next moment he was strong +again, and the door had closed behind him with a resolute bang. + +Out in the street, climbing into his car, he looked up involuntarily +to see if she was still there, but she had gone. As the car, gathering +speed, hummed down the street. Sally was at the telephone listening to +the sleepy voice of Ginger Kemp, which, as he became aware who it +was that had woken him from his rest and what she had to say to him, +magically lost its sleepiness and took on a note of riotous ecstasy. + +Five minutes later, Ginger was splashing in his bath, singing +discordantly. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII. JOURNEY'S END + + + +Darkness was beginning to gather slowly and with almost an apologetic +air, as if it regretted the painful duty of putting an end to the +perfect summer day. Over to the west beyond the trees there still +lingered a faint afterglow, and a new moon shone like a silver sickle +above the big barn. Sally came out of the house and bowed gravely three +times for luck. She stood on the gravel, outside the porch, drinking in +the sweet evening scents, and found life good. + +The darkness, having shown a certain reluctance at the start, was now +buckling down to make a quick and thorough job of it. The sky turned +to a uniform dark blue, picked out with quiet stars. The cement of the +state road which led to Patchogue, Babylon, and other important centres +ceased to be a pale blur and became invisible. Lights appeared in the +windows of the houses across the meadows. From the direction of the +kennels there came a single sleepy bark, and the small white woolly dog +which had scampered out at Sally's heels stopped short and uttered a +challenging squeak. + +The evening was so still that Ginger's footsteps, as he pounded along +the road on his way back from the village, whither he had gone to buy +provisions, evening papers, and wool for the sweater which Sally was +knitting, were audible long before he turned in at the gate. Sally could +not see him, but she looked in the direction of the sound and once again +felt that pleasant, cosy thrill of happiness which had come to her every +evening for the last year. + +"Ginger," she called. + +"What ho!" + +The woolly dog, with another important squeak, scuttled down the drive +to look into the matter, and was coldly greeted. Ginger, for all his +love of dogs, had never been able to bring himself to regard Toto with +affection. He had protested when Sally, a month before, finding Mrs. +Meecher distraught on account of a dreadful lethargy which had seized +her pet, had begged him to offer hospitality and country air to the +invalid. + +"It's wonderful what you've done for Toto, angel," said Sally, as he +came up frigidly eluding that curious animal's leaps of welcome. "He's a +different dog." + +"Bit of luck for him," said Ginger. + +"In all the years I was at Mrs. Meecher's I never knew him move at +anything more rapid than a stately walk. Now he runs about all the +time." + +"The blighter had been overeating from birth," said Ginger. "That was +all that was wrong with him. A little judicious dieting put him right. +We'll be able," said Ginger brightening, "to ship him back next week." + +"I shall quite miss him." + +"I nearly missed him--this morning--with a shoe," said Ginger. "He was +up on the kitchen table wolfing the bacon, and I took steps." + +"My cave-man!" murmured Sally. "I always said you had a frightfully +brutal streak in you. Ginger, what an evening!" + +"Good Lord!" said Ginger suddenly, as they walked into the light of the +open kitchen door. + +"Now what?" + +He stopped and eyed her intently. + +"Do you know you're looking prettier than you were when I started down +to the village!" + +Sally gave his arm a little hug. + +"Beloved!" she said. "Did you get the chops?" + +Ginger froze in his tracks, horrified. + +"Oh, my aunt! I clean forgot them!" + +"Oh, Ginger, you are an old chump. Well, you'll have to go in for a +little judicious dieting, like Toto." + +"I say, I'm most awfully sorry. I got the wool." + +"If you think I'm going to eat wool..." + +"Isn't there anything in the house?" + +"Vegetables and fruit." + +"Fine! But, of course, if you want chops..." + +"Not at all. I'm spiritual. Besides, people say that vegetables are good +for the blood-pressure or something. Of course you forgot to get the +mail, too?" + +"Absolutely not! I was on to it like a knife. Two letters from fellows +wanting Airedale puppies." + +"No! Ginger, we are getting on!" + +"Pretty bloated," agreed Ginger complacently. "Pretty bloated. We'll be +able to get that two-seater if things go buzzing on like this. There was +a letter for you. Here it is." + +"It's from Fillmore," said Sally, examining the envelope as they went +into the kitchen. "And about time, too. I haven't had a word from him +for months." + +She sat down and opened the letter. Ginger, heaving himself on to the +table, wriggled into a position of comfort and started to read his +evening paper. But after he had skimmed over the sporting page he +lowered it and allowed his gaze to rest on Sally's bent head with a +feeling of utter contentment. + +Although a married man of nearly a year's standing, Ginger was still +moving about a magic world in a state of dazed incredulity, unable fully +to realize that such bliss could be. Ginger in his time had seen many +things that looked good from a distance, but not one that had borne the +test of a closer acquaintance--except this business of marriage. + +Marriage, with Sally for a partner, seemed to be one of the very few +things in the world in which there was no catch. His honest eyes glowed +as he watched her. Sally broke into a little splutter of laughter. + +"Ginger, look at this!" + +He reached down and took the slip of paper which she held out to him. +The following legend met his eye, printed in bold letters: + + POPP'S + + OUTSTANDING + + SUCCULENT----APPETIZING----NUTRITIOUS. + + + + (JUST SAY "POP!" A CHILD + + CAN DO IT.) + + + +Ginger regarded this cipher with a puzzled frown. + +"What is it?" he asked. + +"It's Fillmore." + +"How do you mean?" + +Sally gurgled. + +"Fillmore and Gladys have started a little restaurant in Pittsburg." + +"A restaurant!" There was a shocked note in Ginger's voice. Although +he knew that the managerial career of that modern Napoleon, his +brother-in-law, had terminated in something of a smash, he had +never quite lost his reverence for one whom he considered a bit of a +master-mind. That Fillmore Nicholas, the Man of Destiny, should have +descended to conducting a restaurant--and a little restaurant at +that--struck him as almost indecent. + +Sally, on the other hand--for sisters always seem to fail in proper +reverence for the greatness of their brothers--was delighted. + +"It's the most splendid idea," she said with enthusiasm. "It really does +look as if Fillmore was going to amount to something at last. Apparently +they started on quite a small scale, just making pork-pies..." + +"Why Popp?" interrupted Ginger, ventilating a question which was +perplexing him deeply. + +"Just a trade name, silly. Gladys is a wonderful cook, you know, and she +made the pies and Fillmore toddled round selling them. And they did +so well that now they've started a regular restaurant, and that's a +success, too. Listen to this." Sally gurgled again and turned over the +letter. "Where is it? Oh yes! '... sound financial footing. In fact, our +success has been so instantaneous that I have decided to launch out on +a really big scale. It is Big Ideas that lead to Big Business. I am +contemplating a vast extension of this venture of ours, and in a very +short time I shall organize branches in New York, Chicago, Detroit, and +all the big cities, each in charge of a manager and each offering as +a special feature, in addition to the usual restaurant cuisine, these +Popp's Outstanding Pork-pies of ours. That done, and having established +all these branches as going concerns, I shall sail for England and +introduce Popp's Pork-pies there...' Isn't he a little wonder!" + +"Dashed brainy chap. Always said so." + +"I must say I was rather uneasy when I read that. I've seen so many of +Fillmore's Big Ideas. That's always the way with him. He gets something +good and then goes and overdoes it and bursts. However, it's all right +now that he's got Gladys to look after him. She has added a postscript. +Just four words, but oh! how comforting to a sister's heart. 'Yes, I +don't think!' is what she says, and I don't know when I've read anything +more cheering. Thank heaven, she's got poor dear Fillmore well in hand." + +"Pork-pies!" said Ginger, musingly, as the pangs of a healthy +hunger began to assail his interior. "I wish he'd sent us one of the +outstanding little chaps. I could do with it." + +Sally got up and ruffled his red hair. + +"Poor old Ginger! I knew you'd never be able to stick it. Come on, it's +a lovely night, let's walk to the village and revel at the inn. We're +going to be millionaires before we know where we are, so we can afford +it." + + +THE END + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Adventures of Sally, by P. G. 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Wodehouse + </title> + <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> + + body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify} + P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } + hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} + .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; } + blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} + .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} + .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} + div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } + div.middle { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; } + .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} + .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} + .pagenum {display:inline; font-size: 70%; font-style:normal; + margin: 0; padding: 0; position: absolute; right: 1%; + text-align: right;} + pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} + +</style> + </head> + <body> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Adventures of Sally, by P. G. Wodehouse + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Adventures of Sally + +Author: P. G. Wodehouse + +Release Date: July 31, 2009 [EBook #7464] +Last Updated: March 12, 2018 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ADVENTURES OF SALLY *** + + + + +Produced by Tim Barnett, and David Widger + + + + + + +</pre> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <h1> + THE ADVENTURES OF SALLY + </h1> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <h2> + By P. G. Wodehouse + </h2> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <blockquote> + <p class="toc"> + <big><b>CONTENTS</b></big> + </p> + <p> + <br /> <a href="#link2HCH0001"> CHAPTER I. </a> SALLY GIVES A + PARTY <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0002"> CHAPTER II. </a> ENTER + GINGER <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0003"> CHAPTER III. </a> THE + DIGNIFIED MR. CARMYLE <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0004"> CHAPTER IV. + </a> GINGER IN DANGEROUS MOOD <br /><br /> <a + href="#link2HCH0005"> CHAPTER V. </a> SALLY HEARS NEWS <br /><br /> + <a href="#link2HCH0006"> CHAPTER VI. </a> FIRST AID FOR + FILLMORE <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0007"> CHAPTER VII. </a> SOME + MEDITATIONS ON SUCCESS <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0008"> CHAPTER VIII. + </a> REAPPEARANCE OF MR. CARMYLE—AND GINGER <br /><br /> + <a href="#link2HCH0009"> CHAPTER IX. </a> GINGER BECOMES A + RIGHT-HAND MAN <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0010"> CHAPTER X. </a> SALLY + IN THE SHADOWS <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0011"> CHAPTER XI. </a> SALLY + RUNS AWAY <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0012"> CHAPTER XII. </a> SOME + LETTERS FOR GINGER <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0013"> CHAPTER XIII. + </a> STRANGE BEHAVIOUR OF A SPARRING-PARTNER <br /><br /> <a + href="#link2HCH0014"> CHAPTER XIV. </a> MR. ABRAHAMS + RE-ENGAGES AN OLD EMPLOYEE <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0015"> CHAPTER + XV. </a> UNCLE DONALD SPEAKS HIS MIND <br /><br /> <a + href="#link2HCH0016"> CHAPTER XVI. </a> AT THE FLOWER GARDEN + <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0017"> CHAPTER XVII. </a> SALLY + LAYS A GHOST <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0018"> CHAPTER XVIII. </a> JOURNEY'S + END <br /><br /> + </p> + </blockquote> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> <a name="link2HCH0001" id="link2HCH0001"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <h2> + CHAPTER I. SALLY GIVES A PARTY + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + Sally looked contentedly down the long table. She felt happy at last. + Everybody was talking and laughing now, and her party, rallying after an + uncertain start, was plainly the success she had hoped it would be. The + first atmosphere of uncomfortable restraint, caused, she was only too well + aware, by her brother Fillmore's white evening waistcoat, had worn off; + and the male and female patrons of Mrs. Meecher's select boarding-house + (transient and residential) were themselves again. + </p> + <p> + At her end of the table the conversation had turned once more to the great + vital topic of Sally's legacy and what she ought to do with it. The next + best thing to having money of one's own, is to dictate the spending of + somebody else's, and Sally's guests were finding a good deal of + satisfaction in arranging a Budget for her. Rumour having put the sum at + their disposal at a high figure, their suggestions had certain + spaciousness. + </p> + <p> + “Let me tell you,” said Augustus Bartlett, briskly, “what I'd do, if I + were you.” Augustus Bartlett, who occupied an intensely subordinate + position in the firm of Kahn, Morris and Brown, the Wall Street brokers, + always affected a brisk, incisive style of speech, as befitted a man in + close touch with the great ones of Finance. “I'd sink a couple of hundred + thousand in some good, safe bond-issue—we've just put one out which + you would do well to consider—and play about with the rest. When I + say play about, I mean have a flutter in anything good that crops up. + Multiple Steel's worth looking at. They tell me it'll be up to a hundred + and fifty before next Saturday.” + </p> + <p> + Elsa Doland, the pretty girl with the big eyes who sat on Mr. Bartlett's + left, had other views. + </p> + <p> + “Buy a theatre, Sally, and put on good stuff.” + </p> + <p> + “And lose every bean you've got,” said a mild young man, with a deep voice + across the table. “If I had a few hundred thousand,” said the mild young + man, “I'd put every cent of it on Benny Whistler for the heavyweight + championship. I've private information that Battling Tuke has been got at + and means to lie down in the seventh...” + </p> + <p> + “Say, listen,” interrupted another voice, “lemme tell you what I'd do with + four hundred thousand...” + </p> + <p> + “If I had four hundred thousand,” said Elsa Doland, “I know what would be + the first thing I'd do.” + </p> + <p> + “What's that?” asked Sally. + </p> + <p> + “Pay my bill for last week, due this morning.” + </p> + <p> + Sally got up quickly, and flitting down the table, put her arm round her + friend's shoulder and whispered in her ear: + </p> + <p> + “Elsa darling, are you really broke? If you are, you know, I'll...” + </p> + <p> + Elsa Doland laughed. + </p> + <p> + “You're an angel, Sally. There's no one like you. You'd give your last + cent to anyone. Of course I'm not broke. I've just come back from the + road, and I've saved a fortune. I only said that to draw you.” + </p> + <p> + Sally returned to her seat, relieved, and found that the company had now + divided itself into two schools of thought. The conservative and prudent + element, led by Augustus Bartlett, had definitely decided on three hundred + thousand in Liberty Bonds and the rest in some safe real estate; while the + smaller, more sporting section, impressed by the mild young man's inside + information, had already placed Sally's money on Benny Whistler, doling it + out cautiously in small sums so as not to spoil the market. And so solid, + it seemed, was Mr. Tuke's reputation with those in the inner circle of + knowledge that the mild young man was confident that, if you went about + the matter cannily and without precipitation, three to one might be + obtained. It seemed to Sally that the time had come to correct certain + misapprehensions. + </p> + <p> + “I don't know where you get your figures,” she said, “but I'm afraid + they're wrong. I've just twenty-five thousand dollars.” + </p> + <p> + The statement had a chilling effect. To these jugglers with half-millions + the amount mentioned seemed for the moment almost too small to bother + about. It was the sort of sum which they had been mentally setting aside + for the heiress's car fare. Then they managed to adjust their minds to it. + After all, one could do something even with a pittance like twenty-five + thousand. + </p> + <p> + “If I'd twenty-five thousand,” said Augustus Bartlett, the first to rally + from the shock, “I'd buy Amalgamated...” + </p> + <p> + “If I had twenty-five thousand...” began Elsa Doland. + </p> + <p> + “If I'd had twenty-five thousand in the year nineteen hundred,” observed a + gloomy-looking man with spectacles, “I could have started a revolution in + Paraguay.” + </p> + <p> + He brooded sombrely on what might have been. + </p> + <p> + “Well, I'll tell you exactly what I'm going to do,” said Sally. “I'm going + to start with a trip to Europe... France, specially. I've heard France + well spoken of—as soon as I can get my passport; and after I've + loafed there for a few weeks, I'm coming back to look about and find some + nice cosy little business which will let me put money into it and keep me + in luxury. Are there any complaints?” + </p> + <p> + “Even a couple of thousand on Benny Whistler...” said the mild young man. + </p> + <p> + “I don't want your Benny Whistler,” said Sally. “I wouldn't have him if + you gave him to me. If I want to lose money, I'll go to Monte Carlo and do + it properly.” + </p> + <p> + “Monte Carlo,” said the gloomy man, brightening up at the magic name. “I + was in Monte Carlo in the year '97, and if I'd had another fifty + dollars... just fifty... I'd have...” + </p> + <p> + At the far end of the table there was a stir, a cough, and the grating of + a chair on the floor; and slowly, with that easy grace which actors of the + old school learned in the days when acting was acting, Mr. Maxwell + Faucitt, the boarding-house's oldest inhabitant, rose to his feet. + </p> + <p> + “Ladies,” said Mr. Faucitt, bowing courteously, “and...” ceasing to bow + and casting from beneath his white and venerable eyebrows a quelling + glance at certain male members of the boarding-house's younger set who + were showing a disposition towards restiveness, “... gentlemen. I feel + that I cannot allow this occasion to pass without saying a few words.” + </p> + <p> + His audience did not seem surprised. It was possible that life, always + prolific of incident in a great city like New York, might some day produce + an occasion which Mr. Faucitt would feel that he could allow to pass + without saying a few words; but nothing of the sort had happened as yet, + and they had given up hope. Right from the start of the meal they had felt + that it would be optimism run mad to expect the old gentleman to abstain + from speech on the night of Sally Nicholas' farewell dinner party; and + partly because they had braced themselves to it, but principally because + Miss Nicholas' hospitality had left them with a genial feeling of + repletion, they settled themselves to listen with something resembling + equanimity. A movement on the part of the Marvellous Murphys—new + arrivals, who had been playing the Bushwick with their equilibristic act + during the preceding week—to form a party of the extreme left and + heckle the speaker, broke down under a cold look from their hostess. Brief + though their acquaintance had been, both of these lissom young gentlemen + admired Sally immensely. + </p> + <p> + And it should be set on record that this admiration of theirs was not + misplaced. He would have been hard to please who had not been attracted by + Sally. She was a small, trim, wisp of a girl with the tiniest hands and + feet, the friendliest of smiles, and a dimple that came and went in the + curve of her rounded chin. Her eyes, which disappeared when she laughed, + which was often, were a bright hazel; her hair a soft mass of brown. She + had, moreover, a manner, an air of distinction lacking in the majority of + Mrs. Meecher's guests. And she carried youth like a banner. In approving + of Sally, the Marvellous Murphys had been guilty of no lapse from their + high critical standard. + </p> + <p> + “I have been asked,” proceeded Mr. Faucitt, “though I am aware that there + are others here far worthier of such a task—Brutuses compared with + whom I, like Marc Antony, am no orator—I have been asked to propose + the health...” + </p> + <p> + “Who asked you?” It was the smaller of the Marvellous Murphys who spoke. + He was an unpleasant youth, snub-nosed and spotty. Still, he could balance + himself with one hand on an inverted ginger-ale bottle while revolving a + barrel on the soles of his feet. There is good in all of us. + </p> + <p> + “I have been asked,” repeated Mr. Faucitt, ignoring the unmannerly + interruption, which, indeed, he would have found it hard to answer, “to + propose the health of our charming hostess (applause), coupled with the + name of her brother, our old friend Fillmore Nicholas.” + </p> + <p> + The gentleman referred to, who sat at the speaker's end of the table, + acknowledged the tribute with a brief nod of the head. It was a nod of + condescension; the nod of one who, conscious of being hedged about by + social inferiors, nevertheless does his best to be not unkindly. And + Sally, seeing it, debated in her mind for an instant the advisability of + throwing an orange at her brother. There was one lying ready to her hand, + and his glistening shirt-front offered an admirable mark; but she + restrained herself. After all, if a hostess yields to her primitive + impulses, what happens? Chaos. She had just frowned down the exuberance of + the rebellious Murphys, and she felt that if, even with the highest + motives, she began throwing fruit, her influence for good in that quarter + would be weakened. + </p> + <p> + She leaned back with a sigh. The temptation had been hard to resist. A + democratic girl, pomposity was a quality which she thoroughly disliked; + and though she loved him, she could not disguise from herself that, ever + since affluence had descended upon him some months ago, her brother + Fillmore had become insufferably pompous. If there are any young men whom + inherited wealth improves, Fillmore Nicholas was not one of them. He + seemed to regard himself nowadays as a sort of Man of Destiny. To converse + with him was for the ordinary human being like being received in audience + by some more than stand-offish monarch. It had taken Sally over an hour to + persuade him to leave his apartment on Riverside Drive and revisit the + boarding-house for this special occasion; and, when he had come, he had + entered wearing such faultless evening dress that he had made the rest of + the party look like a gathering of tramp-cyclists. His white waistcoat + alone was a silent reproach to honest poverty, and had caused an awkward + constraint right through the soup and fish courses. Most of those present + had known Fillmore Nicholas as an impecunious young man who could make a + tweed suit last longer than one would have believed possible; they had + called him “Fill” and helped him in more than usually lean times with + small loans: but to-night they had eyed the waistcoat dumbly and shrank + back abashed. + </p> + <p> + “Speaking,” said Mr. Faucitt, “as an Englishman—for though I have + long since taken out what are technically known as my 'papers' it was as a + subject of the island kingdom that I first visited this great country—I + may say that the two factors in American life which have always made the + profoundest impression upon me have been the lavishness of American + hospitality and the charm of the American girl. To-night we have been + privileged to witness the American girl in the capacity of hostess, and I + think I am right in saying, in asseverating, in committing myself to the + statement that this has been a night which none of us present here will + ever forget. Miss Nicholas has given us, ladies and gentlemen, a banquet. + I repeat, a banquet. There has been alcoholic refreshment. I do not know + where it came from: I do not ask how it was procured, but we have had it. + Miss Nicholas...” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Faucitt paused to puff at his cigar. Sally's brother Fillmore + suppressed a yawn and glanced at his watch. Sally continued to lean + forward raptly. She knew how happy it made the old gentleman to deliver a + formal speech; and though she wished the subject had been different, she + was prepared to listen indefinitely. + </p> + <p> + “Miss Nicholas,” resumed Mr. Faucitt, lowering his cigar, “... But why,” + he demanded abruptly, “do I call her Miss Nicholas?” + </p> + <p> + “Because it's her name,” hazarded the taller Murphy. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Faucitt eyed him with disfavour. He disapproved of the marvellous + brethren on general grounds because, himself a resident of years standing, + he considered that these transients from the vaudeville stage lowered the + tone of the boarding-house; but particularly because the one who had just + spoken had, on his first evening in the place, addressed him as “grandpa.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, sir,” he said severely, “it is her name. But she has another name, + sweeter to those who love her, those who worship her, those who have + watched her with the eye of sedulous affection through the three years she + has spent beneath this roof, though that name,” said Mr. Faucitt, lowering + the tone of his address and descending to what might almost be termed + personalities, “may not be familiar to a couple of dud acrobats who have + only been in the place a week-end, thank heaven, and are off to-morrow to + infest some other city. That name,” said Mr. Faucitt, soaring once more to + a loftier plane, “is Sally. Our Sally. For three years our Sally has + flitted about this establishment like—I choose the simile advisedly—like + a ray of sunshine. For three years she has made life for us a brighter, + sweeter thing. And now a sudden access of worldly wealth, happily + synchronizing with her twenty-first birthday, is to remove her from our + midst. From our midst, ladies and gentlemen, but not from our hearts. And + I think I may venture to hope, to prognosticate, that, whatever lofty + sphere she may adorn in the future, to whatever heights in the social + world she may soar, she will still continue to hold a corner in her own + golden heart for the comrades of her Bohemian days. Ladies and gentlemen, + I give you our hostess, Miss Sally Nicholas, coupled with the name of our + old friend, her brother Fillmore.” + </p> + <p> + Sally, watching her brother heave himself to his feet as the cheers died + away, felt her heart beat a little faster with anticipation. Fillmore was + a fluent young man, once a power in his college debating society, and it + was for that reason that she had insisted on his coming here tonight. + </p> + <p> + She had guessed that Mr. Faucitt, the old dear, would say all sorts of + delightful things about her, and she had mistrusted her ability to make a + fitting reply. And it was imperative that a fitting reply should proceed + from someone. She knew Mr. Faucitt so well. He looked on these occasions + rather in the light of scenes from some play; and, sustaining his own part + in them with such polished grace, was certain to be pained by anything in + the nature of an anti-climax after he should have ceased to take the + stage. Eloquent himself, he must be answered with eloquence, or his whole + evening would be spoiled. + </p> + <p> + Fillmore Nicholas smoothed a wrinkle out of his white waistcoat; and + having rested one podgy hand on the table-cloth and the thumb of the other + in his pocket, glanced down the table with eyes so haughtily drooping that + Sally's fingers closed automatically about her orange, as she wondered + whether even now it might not be a good thing... + </p> + <p> + It seems to be one of Nature's laws that the most attractive girls should + have the least attractive brothers. Fillmore Nicholas had not worn well. + At the age of seven he had been an extraordinarily beautiful child, but + after that he had gone all to pieces; and now, at the age of twenty-five, + it would be idle to deny that he was something of a mess. For the three + years preceding his twenty-fifth birthday, restricted means and hard work + had kept his figure in check; but with money there had come an + ever-increasing sleekness. He looked as if he fed too often and too well. + </p> + <p> + All this, however, Sally was prepared to forgive him, if he would only + make a good speech. She could see Mr. Faucitt leaning back in his chair, + all courteous attention. Rolling periods were meat and drink to the old + gentleman. + </p> + <p> + Fillmore spoke. + </p> + <p> + “I'm sure,” said Fillmore, “you don't want a speech... Very good of you to + drink our health. Thank you.” + </p> + <p> + He sat down. + </p> + <p> + The effect of these few simple words on the company was marked, but not in + every case identical. To the majority the emotion which they brought was + one of unmixed relief. There had been something so menacing, so easy and + practised, in Fillmore's attitude as he had stood there that the + gloomier-minded had given him at least twenty minutes, and even the + optimists had reckoned that they would be lucky if they got off with ten. + As far as the bulk of the guests were concerned, there was no grumbling. + Fillmore's, to their thinking, had been the ideal after-dinner speech. + </p> + <p> + Far different was it with Mr. Maxwell Faucitt. The poor old man was + wearing such an expression of surprise and dismay as he might have worn + had somebody unexpectedly pulled the chair from under him. He was feeling + the sick shock which comes to those who tread on a non-existent last + stair. And Sally, catching sight of his face, uttered a sharp wordless + exclamation as if she had seen a child fall down and hurt itself in the + street. The next moment she had run round the table and was standing + behind him with her arms round his neck. She spoke across him with a sob + in her voice. + </p> + <p> + “My brother,” she stammered, directing a malevolent look at the immaculate + Fillmore, who, avoiding her gaze, glanced down his nose and smoothed + another wrinkle out of his waistcoat, “has not said quite—quite all + I hoped he was going to say. I can't make a speech, but...” Sally gulped, + “... but, I love you all and of course I shall never forget you, and... + and...” + </p> + <p> + Here Sally kissed Mr. Faucitt and burst into tears. + </p> + <p> + “There, there,” said Mr. Faucitt, soothingly. The kindest critic could not + have claimed that Sally had been eloquent: nevertheless Mr. Maxwell + Faucitt was conscious of no sense of anti-climax. + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + Sally had just finished telling her brother Fillmore what a pig he was. + The lecture had taken place in the street outside the boarding-house + immediately on the conclusion of the festivities, when Fillmore, who had + furtively collected his hat and overcoat, had stolen forth into the night, + had been overtaken and brought to bay by his justly indignant sister. Her + remarks, punctuated at intervals by bleating sounds from the accused, had + lasted some ten minutes. + </p> + <p> + As she paused for breath, Fillmore seemed to expand, like an indiarubber + ball which has been sat on. Dignified as he was to the world, he had never + been able to prevent himself being intimidated by Sally when in one of + these moods of hers. He regretted this, for it hurt his self-esteem, but + he did not see how the fact could be altered. Sally had always been like + that. Even the uncle, who after the deaths of their parents had become + their guardian, had never, though a grim man, been able to cope + successfully with Sally. In that last hectic scene three years ago, which + had ended in their going out into the world, together like a second Adam + and Eve, the verbal victory had been hers. And it had been Sally who had + achieved triumph in the one battle which Mrs. Meecher, apparently as a + matter of duty, always brought about with each of her patrons in the first + week of their stay. A sweet-tempered girl, Sally, like most women of a + generous spirit, had cyclonic potentialities. + </p> + <p> + As she seemed to have said her say, Fillmore kept on expanding till he had + reached the normal, when he ventured upon a speech for the defence. + </p> + <p> + “What have I done?” demanded Fillmore plaintively. + </p> + <p> + “Do you want to hear all over again?” + </p> + <p> + “No, no,” said Fillmore hastily. “But, listen, Sally, you don't understand + my position. You don't seem to realize that all that sort of thing, all + that boarding-house stuff, is a thing of the past. One's got beyond it. + One wants to drop it. One wants to forget it, darn it! Be fair. Look at it + from my viewpoint. I'm going to be a big man...” + </p> + <p> + “You're going to be a fat man,” said Sally, coldly. + </p> + <p> + Fillmore refrained from discussing the point. He was sensitive. + </p> + <p> + “I'm going to do big things,” he substituted. “I've got a deal on at this + very moment which... well, I can't tell you about it, but it's going to be + big. Well, what I'm driving at, is about all this sort of thing”—he + indicated the lighted front of Mrs. Meecher's home-from-home with a wide + gesture—“is that it's over. Finished and done with. These people + were all very well when...” + </p> + <p> + “... when you'd lost your week's salary at poker and wanted to borrow a + few dollars for the rent.” + </p> + <p> + “I always paid them back,” protested Fillmore, defensively. + </p> + <p> + “I did.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, we did,” said Fillmore, accepting the amendment with the air of a + man who has no time for chopping straws. “Anyway, what I mean is, I don't + see why, just because one has known people at a certain period in one's + life when one was practically down and out, one should have them round + one's neck for ever. One can't prevent people forming an I-knew-him-when + club, but, darn it, one needn't attend the meetings.” + </p> + <p> + “One's friends...” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, friends,” said Fillmore. “That's just where all this makes me so + tired. One's in a position where all these people are entitled to call + themselves one's friends, simply because father put it in his will that I + wasn't to get the money till I was twenty-five, instead of letting me have + it at twenty-one like anybody else. I wonder where I should have been by + now if I could have got that money when I was twenty-one.” + </p> + <p> + “In the poor-house, probably,” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + Fillmore was wounded. + </p> + <p> + “Ah! you don't believe in me,” he sighed. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, you would be all right if you had one thing,” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + Fillmore passed his qualities in swift review before his mental eye. + Brains? Dash? Spaciousness? Initiative? All present and correct. He + wondered where Sally imagined the hiatus to exist. + </p> + <p> + “One thing?” he said. “What's that?” + </p> + <p> + “A nurse.” + </p> + <p> + Fillmore's sense of injury deepened. He supposed that this was always the + way, that those nearest to a man never believed in his ability till he had + proved it so masterfully that it no longer required the assistance of + faith. Still, it was trying; and there was not much consolation to be + derived from the thought that Napoleon had had to go through this sort of + thing in his day. “I shall find my place in the world,” he said sulkily. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, you'll find your place all right,” said Sally. “And I'll come round + and bring you jelly and read to you on the days when visitors are + allowed... Oh, hullo.” + </p> + <p> + The last remark was addressed to a young man who had been swinging briskly + along the sidewalk from the direction of Broadway and who now, coming + abreast of them, stopped. + </p> + <p> + “Good evening, Mr. Foster.” + </p> + <p> + “Good evening. Miss Nicholas.” + </p> + <p> + “You don't know my brother, do you?” + </p> + <p> + “I don't believe I do.” + </p> + <p> + “He left the underworld before you came to it,” said Sally. “You wouldn't + think it to look at him, but he was once a prune-eater among the + proletariat, even as you and I. Mrs. Meecher looks on him as a son.” + </p> + <p> + The two men shook hands. Fillmore was not short, but Gerald Foster with + his lean, well-built figure seemed to tower over him. He was an + Englishman, a man in the middle twenties, clean-shaven, keen-eyed, and + very good to look at. Fillmore, who had recently been going in for one of + those sum-up-your-fellow-man-at-a-glance courses, the better to fit + himself for his career of greatness, was rather impressed. It seemed to + him that this Mr. Foster, like himself, was one of those who Get There. If + you are that kind yourself, you get into the knack of recognizing the + others. It is a sort of gift. + </p> + <p> + There was a few moments of desultory conversation, of the kind that + usually follows an introduction, and then Fillmore, by no means sorry to + get the chance, took advantage of the coming of this new arrival to remove + himself. He had not enjoyed his chat with Sally, and it seemed probable + that he would enjoy a continuation of it even less. He was glad that Mr. + Foster had happened along at this particular juncture. Excusing himself + briefly, he hurried off down the street. + </p> + <p> + Sally stood for a minute, watching him till he had disappeared round the + corner. She had a slightly regretful feeling that, now it was too late, + she would think of a whole lot more good things which it would have been + agreeable to say to him. And it had become obvious to her that Fillmore + was not getting nearly enough of that kind of thing said to him nowadays. + Then she dismissed him from her mind and turning to Gerald Foster, slipped + her arm through his. + </p> + <p> + “Well, Jerry, darling,” she said. “What a shame you couldn't come to the + party. Tell me all about everything.” + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + It was exactly two months since Sally had become engaged to Gerald Foster; + but so rigorously had they kept the secret that nobody at Mrs. Meecher's + so much as suspected it. To Sally, who all her life had hated concealing + things, secrecy of any kind was objectionable: but in this matter Gerald + had shown an odd streak almost of furtiveness in his character. An + announced engagement complicated life. People fussed about you and + bothered you. People either watched you or avoided you. Such were his + arguments, and Sally, who would have glossed over and found excuses for a + disposition on his part towards homicide or arson, put them down to + artistic sensitiveness. There is nobody so sensitive as your artist, + particularly if he be unsuccessful: and when an artist has so little + success that he cannot afford to make a home for the woman he loves, his + sensitiveness presumably becomes great indeed. Putting herself in his + place, Sally could see that a protracted engagement, known by everybody, + would be a standing advertisement of Gerald's failure to make good: and + she acquiesced in the policy of secrecy, hoping that it would not last + long. It seemed absurd to think of Gerald as an unsuccessful man. He had + in him, as the recent Fillmore had perceived, something dynamic. He was + one of those men of whom one could predict that they would succeed very + suddenly and rapidly—overnight, as it were. + </p> + <p> + “The party,” said Sally, “went off splendidly.” They had passed the + boarding-house door, and were walking slowly down the street. “Everybody + enjoyed themselves, I think, even though Fillmore did his best to spoil + things by coming looking like an advertisement of What The Smart Men Will + Wear This Season. You didn't see his waistcoat just now. He had covered it + up. Conscience, I suppose. It was white and bulgy and gleaming and full up + of pearl buttons and everything. I saw Augustus Bartlett curl up like a + burnt feather when he caught sight of it. Still, time seemed to heal the + wound, and everybody relaxed after a bit. Mr. Faucitt made a speech and I + made a speech and cried, and...oh, it was all very festive. It only needed + you.” + </p> + <p> + “I wish I could have come. I had to go to that dinner, though. Sally...” + Gerald paused, and Sally saw that he was electric with suppressed + excitement. “Sally, the play's going to be put on!” + </p> + <p> + Sally gave a little gasp. She had lived this moment in anticipation for + weeks. She had always known that sooner or later this would happen. She + had read his plays over and over again, and was convinced that they were + wonderful. Of course, hers was a biased view, but then Elsa Doland also + admired them; and Elsa's opinion was one that carried weight. Elsa was + another of those people who were bound to succeed suddenly. Even old Mr. + Faucitt, who was a stern judge of acting and rather inclined to consider + that nowadays there was no such thing, believed that she was a girl with a + future who would do something big directly she got her chance. + </p> + <p> + “Jerry!” She gave his arm a hug. “How simply terrific! Then Goble and Kohn + have changed their minds after all and want it? I knew they would.” + </p> + <p> + A slight cloud seemed to dim the sunniness of the author's mood. + </p> + <p> + “No, not that one,” he said reluctantly. “No hope there, I'm afraid. I saw + Goble this morning about that, and he said it didn't add up right. The one + that's going to be put on is 'The Primrose Way.' You remember? It's got a + big part for a girl in it.” + </p> + <p> + “Of course! The one Elsa liked so much. Well, that's just as good. Who's + going to do it? I thought you hadn't sent it out again.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, it happens...” Gerald hesitated once more. “It seems that this man + I was dining with to-night—a man named Cracknell...” + </p> + <p> + “Cracknell? Not the Cracknell?” + </p> + <p> + “The Cracknell?” + </p> + <p> + “The one people are always talking about. The man they call the + Millionaire Kid.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes. Why, do you know him?” + </p> + <p> + “He was at Harvard with Fillmore. I never saw him, but he must be rather a + painful person.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, he's all right. Not much brains, of course, but—well, he's all + right. And, anyway, he wants to put the play on.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, that's splendid,” said Sally: but she could not get the right ring + of enthusiasm into her voice. She had had ideals for Gerald. She had + dreamed of him invading Broadway triumphantly under the banner of one of + the big managers whose name carried a prestige, and there seemed something + unworthy in this association with a man whose chief claim to eminence lay + in the fact that he was credited by metropolitan gossip with possessing + the largest private stock of alcohol in existence. + </p> + <p> + “I thought you would be pleased,” said Gerald. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I am,” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + With the buoyant optimism which never deserted her for long, she had + already begun to cast off her momentary depression. After all, did it + matter who financed a play so long as it obtained a production? A manager + was simply a piece of machinery for paying the bills; and if he had money + for that purpose, why demand asceticism and the finer sensibilities from + him? The real thing that mattered was the question of who was going to + play the leading part, that deftly drawn character which had so excited + the admiration of Elsa Doland. She sought information on this point. + </p> + <p> + “Who will play Ruth?” she asked. “You must have somebody wonderful. It + needs a tremendously clever woman. Did Mr. Cracknell say anything about + that?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, yes, we discussed that, of course.” + </p> + <p> + “Well?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, it seems...” Again Sally noticed that odd, almost stealthy + embarrassment. Gerald appeared unable to begin a sentence to-night without + feeling his way into it like a man creeping cautiously down a dark alley. + She noticed it the more because it was so different from his usual direct + method. Gerald, as a rule, was not one of those who apologize for + themselves. He was forthright and masterful and inclined to talk to her + from a height. To-night he seemed different. + </p> + <p> + He broke off, was silent for a moment, and began again with a question. + </p> + <p> + “Do you know Mabel Hobson?” + </p> + <p> + “Mabel Hobson? I've seen her in the 'Follies,' of course.” + </p> + <p> + Sally started. A suspicion had stung her, so monstrous that its absurdity + became manifest the moment it had formed. And yet was it absurd? Most + Broadway gossip filtered eventually into the boarding-house, chiefly + through the medium of that seasoned sport, the mild young man who thought + so highly of the redoubtable Benny Whistler, and she was aware that the + name of Reginald Cracknell, which was always getting itself linked with + somebody, had been coupled with that of Miss Hobson. It seemed likely that + in this instance rumour spoke truth, for the lady was of that compellingly + blonde beauty which attracts the Cracknells of this world. But even so... + </p> + <p> + “It seems that Cracknell...” said Gerald. “Apparently this man + Cracknell...” He was finding Sally's bright, horrified gaze somewhat + trying. “Well, the fact is Cracknell believes in Mabel Hobson...and... + well, he thinks this part would suit her.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, Jerry!” + </p> + <p> + Could infatuation go to such a length? Could even the spacious heart of a + Reginald Cracknell so dominate that gentleman's small size in heads as to + make him entrust a part like Ruth in “The Primrose Way” to one who, when + desired by the producer of her last revue to carry a bowl of roses across + the stage and place it on a table, had rebelled on the plea that she had + not been engaged as a dancer? Surely even lovelorn Reginald could perceive + that this was not the stuff of which great emotional actresses are made. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, Jerry!” she said again. + </p> + <p> + There was an uncomfortable silence. They turned and walked back in the + direction of the boarding-house. Somehow Gerald's arm had managed to get + itself detached from Sally's. She was conscious of a curious dull ache + that was almost like a physical pain. + </p> + <p> + “Jerry! Is it worth it?” she burst out vehemently. + </p> + <p> + The question seemed to sting the young man into something like his usual + decisive speech. + </p> + <p> + “Worth it? Of course it's worth it. It's a Broadway production. That's all + that matters. Good heavens! I've been trying long enough to get a play on + Broadway, and it isn't likely that I'm going to chuck away my chance when + it comes along just because one might do better in the way of casting.” + </p> + <p> + “But, Jerry! Mabel Hobson! It's... it's murder! Murder in the first + degree.” + </p> + <p> + “Nonsense. She'll be all right. The part will play itself. Besides, she + has a personality and a following, and Cracknell will spend all the money + in the world to make the thing a success. And it will be a start, whatever + happens. Of course, it's worth it.” + </p> + <p> + Fillmore would have been impressed by this speech. He would have + recognized and respected in it the unmistakable ring which characterizes + even the lightest utterances of those who get there. On Sally it had not + immediately that effect. Nevertheless, her habit of making the best of + things, working together with that primary article of her creed that the + man she loved could do no wrong, succeeded finally in raising her spirits. + Of course Jerry was right. It would have been foolish to refuse a contract + because all its clauses were not ideal. + </p> + <p> + “You old darling,” she said affectionately attaching herself to the vacant + arm once more and giving it a penitent squeeze, “you're quite right. Of + course you are. I can see it now. I was only a little startled at first. + Everything's going to be wonderful. Let's get all our chickens out and + count 'em. How are you going to spend the money?” + </p> + <p> + “I know how I'm going to spend a dollar of it,” said Gerald completely + restored. + </p> + <p> + “I mean the big money. What's a dollar?” + </p> + <p> + “It pays for a marriage-licence.” + </p> + <p> + Sally gave his arm another squeeze. + </p> + <p> + “Ladies and gentlemen,” she said. “Look at this man. Observe him. My + partner!” + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0002" id="link2HCH0002"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER II. ENTER GINGER + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + Sally was sitting with her back against a hillock of golden sand, watching + with half-closed eyes the denizens of Roville-sur-Mer at their familiar + morning occupations. At Roville, as at most French seashore resorts, the + morning is the time when the visiting population assembles in force on the + beach. Whiskered fathers of families made cheerful patches of colour in + the foreground. Their female friends and relatives clustered in groups + under gay parasols. Dogs roamed to and fro, and children dug industriously + with spades, ever and anon suspending their labours in order to smite one + another with these handy implements. One of the dogs, a poodle of military + aspect, wandered up to Sally: and discovering that she was in possession + of a box of sweets, decided to remain and await developments. + </p> + <p> + Few things are so pleasant as the anticipation of them, but Sally's + vacation had proved an exception to this rule. It had been a magic month + of lazy happiness. She had drifted luxuriously from one French town to + another, till the charm of Roville, with its blue sky, its Casino, its + snow-white hotels along the Promenade, and its general glitter and gaiety, + had brought her to a halt. Here she could have stayed indefinitely, but + the voice of America was calling her back. Gerald had written to say that + “The Primrose Way” was to be produced in Detroit, preliminary to its New + York run, so soon that, if she wished to see the opening, she must return + at once. A scrappy, hurried, unsatisfactory letter, the letter of a busy + man: but one that Sally could not ignore. She was leaving Roville + to-morrow. + </p> + <p> + To-day, however, was to-day: and she sat and watched the bathers with a + familiar feeling of peace, revelling as usual in the still novel sensation + of having nothing to do but bask in the warm sunshine and listen to the + faint murmur of the little waves. + </p> + <p> + But, if there was one drawback, she had discovered, to a morning on the + Roville plage, it was that you had a tendency to fall asleep: and this is + a degrading thing to do so soon after breakfast, even if you are on a + holiday. Usually, Sally fought stoutly against the temptation, but to-day + the sun was so warm and the whisper of the waves so insinuating that she + had almost dozed off, when she was aroused by voices close at hand. There + were many voices on the beach, both near and distant, but these were + talking English, a novelty in Roville, and the sound of the familiar + tongue jerked Sally back from the borders of sleep. A few feet away, two + men had seated themselves on the sand. + </p> + <p> + From the first moment she had set out on her travels, it had been one of + Sally's principal amusements to examine the strangers whom chance threw in + her way and to try by the light of her intuition to fit them out with + characters and occupations: nor had she been discouraged by an almost + consistent failure to guess right. Out of the corner of her eye she + inspected these two men. + </p> + <p> + The first of the pair did not attract her. He was a tall, dark man whose + tight, precise mouth and rather high cheeks bones gave him an appearance + vaguely sinister. He had the dusky look of the clean-shaven man whose life + is a perpetual struggle with a determined beard. He certainly shaved twice + a day, and just as certainly had the self-control not to swear when he cut + himself. She could picture him smiling nastily when this happened. + </p> + <p> + “Hard,” diagnosed Sally. “I shouldn't like him. A lawyer or something, I + think.” + </p> + <p> + She turned to the other and found herself looking into his eyes. This was + because he had been staring at Sally with the utmost intentness ever since + his arrival. His mouth had opened slightly. He had the air of a man who, + after many disappointments, has at last found something worth looking at. + </p> + <p> + “Rather a dear,” decided Sally. + </p> + <p> + He was a sturdy, thick-set young man with an amiable, freckled face and + the reddest hair Sally had ever seen. He had a square chin, and at one + angle of the chin a slight cut. And Sally was convinced that, however he + had behaved on receipt of that wound, it had not been with superior + self-control. + </p> + <p> + “A temper, I should think,” she meditated. “Very quick, but soon over. Not + very clever, I should say, but nice.” + </p> + <p> + She looked away, finding his fascinated gaze a little embarrassing. + </p> + <p> + The dark man, who in the objectionably competent fashion which, one felt, + characterized all his actions, had just succeeded in lighting a cigarette + in the teeth of a strong breeze, threw away the match and resumed the + conversation, which had presumably been interrupted by the process of + sitting down. + </p> + <p> + “And how is Scrymgeour?” he inquired. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, all right,” replied the young man with red hair absently. Sally was + looking straight in front of her, but she felt that his eyes were still + busy. + </p> + <p> + “I was surprised at his being here. He told me he meant to stay in Paris.” + </p> + <p> + There was a slight pause. Sally gave the attentive poodle a piece of + nougat. + </p> + <p> + “I say,” observed the red-haired young man in clear, penetrating tones + that vibrated with intense feeling, “that's the prettiest girl I've seen + in my life!” + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + At this frank revelation of the red-haired young man's personal opinions, + Sally, though considerably startled, was not displeased. A broad-minded + girl, the outburst seemed to her a legitimate comment on a matter of + public interest. The young man's companion, on the other hand, was + unmixedly shocked. + </p> + <p> + “My dear fellow!” he ejaculated. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, it's all right,” said the red-haired young man, unmoved. “She can't + understand. There isn't a bally soul in this dashed place that can speak a + word of English. If I didn't happen to remember a few odd bits of French, + I should have starved by this time. That girl,” he went on, returning to + the subject most imperatively occupying his mind, “is an absolute topper! + I give you my solemn word I've never seen anybody to touch her. Look at + those hands and feet. You don't get them outside France. Of course, her + mouth is a bit wide,” he said reluctantly. + </p> + <p> + Sally's immobility, added to the other's assurance concerning the + linguistic deficiencies of the inhabitants of Roville, seemed to reassure + the dark man. He breathed again. At no period of his life had he ever + behaved with anything but the most scrupulous correctness himself, but he + had quailed at the idea of being associated even remotely with + incorrectness in another. It had been a black moment for him when the + red-haired young man had uttered those few kind words. + </p> + <p> + “Still you ought to be careful,” he said austerely. + </p> + <p> + He looked at Sally, who was now dividing her attention between the poodle + and a raffish-looking mongrel, who had joined the party, and returned to + the topic of the mysterious Scrymgeour. + </p> + <p> + “How is Scrymgeour's dyspepsia?” + </p> + <p> + The red-haired young man seemed but faintly interested in the vicissitudes + of Scrymgeour's interior. + </p> + <p> + “Do you notice the way her hair sort of curls over her ears?” he said. + “Eh? Oh, pretty much the same, I think.” + </p> + <p> + “What hotel are you staying at?” + </p> + <p> + “The Normandie.” + </p> + <p> + Sally, dipping into the box for another chocolate cream, gave an + imperceptible start. She, too, was staying at the Normandie. She presumed + that her admirer was a recent arrival, for she had seen nothing of him at + the hotel. + </p> + <p> + “The Normandie?” The dark man looked puzzled. “I know Roville pretty well + by report, but I've never heard of any Hotel Normandie. Where is it?” + </p> + <p> + “It's a little shanty down near the station. Not much of a place. Still, + it's cheap, and the cooking's all right.” + </p> + <p> + His companion's bewilderment increased. + </p> + <p> + “What on earth is a man like Scrymgeour doing there?” he said. Sally was + conscious of an urgent desire to know more and more about the absent + Scrymgeour. Constant repetition of his name had made him seem almost like + an old friend. “If there's one thing he's fussy about...” + </p> + <p> + “There are at least eleven thousand things he's fussy about,” interrupted + the red-haired young man disapprovingly. “Jumpy old blighter!” + </p> + <p> + “If there's one thing he's particular about, it's the sort of hotel he + goes to. Ever since I've known him he has always wanted the best. I should + have thought he would have gone to the Splendide.” He mused on this + problem in a dissatisfied sort of way for a moment, then seemed to + reconcile himself to the fact that a rich man's eccentricities must be + humoured. “I'd like to see him again. Ask him if he will dine with me at + the Splendide to-night. Say eight sharp.” + </p> + <p> + Sally, occupied with her dogs, whose numbers had now been augmented by a + white terrier with a black patch over its left eye, could not see the + young man's face: but his voice, when he replied, told her that something + was wrong. There was a false airiness in it. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, Scrymgeour isn't in Roville.” + </p> + <p> + “No? Where is he?” + </p> + <p> + “Paris, I believe.” + </p> + <p> + “What!” The dark man's voice sharpened. He sounded as though he were + cross-examining a reluctant witness. “Then why aren't you there? What are + you doing here? Did he give you a holiday?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, he did.” + </p> + <p> + “When do you rejoin him?” + </p> + <p> + “I don't.” + </p> + <p> + “What!” + </p> + <p> + The red-haired young man's manner was not unmistakably dogged. + </p> + <p> + “Well, if you want to know,” he said, “the old blighter fired me the day + before yesterday.” + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + There was a shuffling of sand as the dark man sprang up. Sally, intent on + the drama which was unfolding itself beside her, absent-mindedly gave the + poodle a piece of nougat which should by rights have gone to the terrier. + She shot a swift glance sideways, and saw the dark man standing in an + attitude rather reminiscent of the stern father of melodrama about to + drive his erring daughter out into the snow. The red-haired young man, + outwardly stolid, was gazing before him down the beach at a fat bather in + an orange suit who, after six false starts, was now actually in the water, + floating with the dignity of a wrecked balloon. + </p> + <p> + “Do you mean to tell me,” demanded the dark man, “that, after all the + trouble the family took to get you what was practically a sinecure with + endless possibilities if you only behaved yourself, you have deliberately + thrown away...” A despairing gesture completed the sentence. “Good God, + you're hopeless!” + </p> + <p> + The red-haired young man made no reply. He continued to gaze down the + beach. Of all outdoor sports, few are more stimulating than watching + middle-aged Frenchmen bathe. Drama, action, suspense, all are here. From + the first stealthy testing of the water with an apprehensive toe to the + final seal-like plunge, there is never a dull moment. And apart from the + excitement of the thing, judging it from a purely aesthetic standpoint, + his must be a dull soul who can fail to be uplifted by the spectacle of a + series of very stout men with whiskers, seen in tight bathing suits + against a background of brightest blue. Yet the young man with red hair, + recently in the employment of Mr. Scrymgeour, eyed this free circus + without any enjoyment whatever. + </p> + <p> + “It's maddening! What are you going to do? What do you expect us to do? + Are we to spend our whole lives getting you positions which you won't + keep? I can tell you we're... it's monstrous! It's sickening! Good God!” + </p> + <p> + And with these words the dark man, apparently feeling, as Sally had + sometimes felt in the society of her brother Fillmore, the futility of + mere language, turned sharply and stalked away up the beach, the dignity + of his exit somewhat marred a moment later by the fact of his straw hat + blowing off and being trodden on by a passing child. + </p> + <p> + He left behind him the sort of electric calm which follows the falling of + a thunderbolt; that stunned calm through which the air seems still to + quiver protestingly. How long this would have lasted one cannot say: for + towards the end of the first minute it was shattered by a purely + terrestrial uproar. With an abruptness heralded only by one short, low + gurgling snarl, there sprang into being the prettiest dog fight that + Roville had seen that season. + </p> + <p> + It was the terrier with the black patch who began it. That was Sally's + opinion: and such, one feels, will be the verdict of history. His best + friend, anxious to make out a case for him, could not have denied that he + fired the first gun of the campaign. But we must be just. The fault was + really Sally's. Absorbed in the scene which had just concluded and acutely + inquisitive as to why the shadowy Scrymgeour had seen fit to dispense with + the red-haired young man's services, she had thrice in succession helped + the poodle out of his turn. The third occasion was too much for the + terrier. + </p> + <p> + There is about any dog fight a wild, gusty fury which affects the average + mortal with something of the helplessness induced by some vast clashing of + the elements. It seems so outside one's jurisdiction. One is oppressed + with a sense of the futility of interference. And this was no ordinary dog + fight. It was a stunning mêlée, which would have excited favourable + comment even among the blasé residents of a negro quarter or the not + easily-pleased critics of a Lancashire mining-village. From all over the + beach dogs of every size, breed, and colour were racing to the scene: and + while some of these merely remained in the ringside seats and barked, a + considerable proportion immediately started fighting one another on + general principles, well content to be in action without bothering about + first causes. The terrier had got the poodle by the left hind-leg and was + restating his war-aims. The raffish mongrel was apparently endeavouring to + fletcherize a complete stranger of the Sealyham family. + </p> + <p> + Sally was frankly unequal to the situation, as were the entire crowd of + spectators who had come galloping up from the water's edge. She had been + paralysed from the start. Snarling bundles bumped against her legs and + bounced away again, but she made no move. Advice in fluent French rent the + air. Arms waved, and well-filled bathing suits leaped up and down. But + nobody did anything practical until in the centre of the theatre of war + there suddenly appeared the red-haired young man. + </p> + <p> + The only reason why dog fights do not go on for ever is that Providence + has decided that on each such occasion there shall always be among those + present one Master Mind; one wizard who, whatever his shortcomings in + other battles of life, is in this single particular sphere competent and + dominating. At Roville-sur-Mer it was the red-haired young man. His dark + companion might have turned from him in disgust: his services might not + have seemed worth retaining by the haughty Scrymgeour: he might be a pain + in the neck to “the family”; but he did know how to stop a dog fight. From + the first moment of his intervention calm began to steal over the scene. + He had the same effect on the almost inextricably entwined belligerents + as, in mediaeval legend, the Holy Grail, sliding down the sunbeam, used to + have on battling knights. He did not look like a dove of peace, but the + most captious could not have denied that he brought home the goods. There + was a magic in his soothing hands, a spell in his voice: and in a shorter + time than one would have believed possible dog after dog had been sorted + out and calmed down; until presently all that was left of Armageddon was + one solitary small Scotch terrier, thoughtfully licking a chewed leg. The + rest of the combatants, once more in their right mind and wondering what + all the fuss was about, had been captured and haled away in a whirl of + recrimination by voluble owners. + </p> + <p> + Having achieved this miracle, the young man turned to Sally. Gallant, one + might say reckless, as he had been a moment before, he now gave + indications of a rather pleasing shyness. He braced himself with that + painful air of effort which announces to the world that an Englishman is + about to speak a language other than his own. + </p> + <p> + “J'espère,” he said, having swallowed once or twice to brace himself up + for the journey through the jungle of a foreign tongue, “J'espère que vous + n'êtes pas—oh, dammit, what's the word—J'espère que vous + n'êtes pas blessée?” + </p> + <p> + “Blessée?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, blessée. Wounded. Hurt, don't you know. Bitten. Oh, dash it. + J'espère...” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, bitten!” said Sally, dimpling. “Oh, no, thanks very much. I wasn't + bitten. And I think it was awfully brave of you to save all our lives.” + </p> + <p> + The compliment seemed to pass over the young man's head. He stared at + Sally with horrified eyes. Over his amiable face there swept a vivid + blush. His jaw dropped. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, my sainted aunt!” he ejaculated. + </p> + <p> + Then, as if the situation was too much for him and flight the only + possible solution, he spun round and disappeared at a walk so rapid that + it was almost a run. Sally watched him go and was sorry that he had torn + himself away. She still wanted to know why Scrymgeour had fired him. + </p> + <p> + 4 + </p> + <p> + Bedtime at Roville is an hour that seems to vary according to one's + proximity to the sea. The gilded palaces along the front keep deplorable + hours, polluting the night air till dawn with indefatigable jazz: but at + the pensions of the economical like the Normandie, early to bed is the + rule. True, Jules, the stout young native who combined the offices of + night-clerk and lift attendant at that establishment, was on duty in the + hall throughout the night, but few of the Normandie's patrons made use of + his services. + </p> + <p> + Sally, entering shortly before twelve o'clock on the night of the day on + which the dark man, the red-haired young man, and their friend Scrymgeour + had come into her life, found the little hall dim and silent. Through the + iron cage of the lift a single faint bulb glowed: another, over the desk + in the far corner, illuminated the upper half of Jules, slumbering in a + chair. Jules seemed to Sally to be on duty in some capacity or other all + the time. His work, like women's, was never done. He was now restoring his + tissues with a few winks of much-needed beauty sleep. Sally, who had been + to the Casino to hear the band and afterwards had strolled on the moonlit + promenade, had a guilty sense of intrusion. + </p> + <p> + As she stood there, reluctant to break in on Jules' rest—for her + sympathetic heart, always at the disposal of the oppressed, had long ached + for this overworked peon—she was relieved to hear footsteps in the + street outside, followed by the opening of the front door. If Jules would + have had to wake up anyway, she felt her sense of responsibility lessened. + The door, having opened, closed again with a bang. Jules stirred, gurgled, + blinked, and sat up, and Sally, turning, perceived that the new arrival + was the red-haired young man. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, good evening,” said Sally welcomingly. + </p> + <p> + The young man stopped, and shuffled uncomfortably. The morning's + happenings were obviously still green in his memory. He had either not + ceased blushing since their last meeting or he was celebrating their + reunion by beginning to blush again: for his face was a familiar scarlet. + </p> + <p> + “Er—good evening,” he said, disentangling his feet, which, in the + embarrassment of the moment, had somehow got coiled up together. + </p> + <p> + “Or bon soir, I suppose you would say,” murmured Sally. + </p> + <p> + The young man acknowledged receipt of this thrust by dropping his hat and + tripping over it as he stooped to pick it up. + </p> + <p> + Jules, meanwhile, who had been navigating in a sort of somnambulistic + trance in the neighbourhood of the lift, now threw back the cage with a + rattle. + </p> + <p> + “It's a shame to have woken you up,” said Sally, commiseratingly, stepping + in. + </p> + <p> + Jules did not reply, for the excellent reason that he had not been woken + up. Constant practice enabled him to do this sort of work without breaking + his slumber. His brain, if you could call it that, was working + automatically. He had shut up the gate with a clang and was tugging + sluggishly at the correct rope, so that the lift was going slowly up + instead of retiring down into the basement, but he was not awake. + </p> + <p> + Sally and the red-haired young man sat side by side on the small seat, + watching their conductor's efforts. After the first spurt, conversation + had languished. Sally had nothing of immediate interest to say, and her + companion seemed to be one of these strong, silent men you read about. + Only a slight snore from Jules broke the silence. + </p> + <p> + At the third floor Sally leaned forward and prodded Jules in the lower + ribs. All through her stay at Roville, she had found in dealing with the + native population that actions spoke louder than words. If she wanted + anything in a restaurant or at a shop, she pointed; and, when she wished + the lift to stop, she prodded the man in charge. It was a system worth a + dozen French conversation books. + </p> + <p> + Jules brought the machine to a halt: and it was at this point that he + should have done the one thing connected with his professional activities + which he did really well—the opening, to wit, of the iron cage. + There are ways of doing this. Jules' was the right way. He was accustomed + to do it with a flourish, and generally remarked “V'la!” in a modest but + self-congratulatory voice as though he would have liked to see another man + who could have put through a job like that. Jules' opinion was that he + might not be much to look at, but that he could open a lift door. + </p> + <p> + To-night, however, it seemed as if even this not very exacting feat was + beyond his powers. Instead of inserting his key in the lock, he stood + staring in an attitude of frozen horror. He was a man who took most things + in life pretty seriously, and whatever was the little difficulty just now + seemed to have broken him all up. + </p> + <p> + “There appears,” said Sally, turning to her companion, “to be a hitch. + Would you mind asking what's the matter? I don't know any French myself + except 'oo la la!'” + </p> + <p> + The young man, thus appealed to, nerved himself to the task. He eyed the + melancholy Jules doubtfully, and coughed in a strangled sort of way. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, esker... esker vous...” + </p> + <p> + “Don't weaken,” said Sally. “I think you've got him going.” + </p> + <p> + “Esker vous... Pourquoi vous ne... I mean ne vous... that is to say, quel + est le raison...” + </p> + <p> + He broke off here, because at this point Jules began to explain. He + explained very rapidly and at considerable length. The fact that neither + of his hearers understood a word of what he was saying appeared not to + have impressed itself upon him. Or, if he gave a thought to it, he + dismissed the objection as trifling. He wanted to explain, and he + explained. Words rushed from him like water from a geyser. Sounds which + you felt you would have been able to put a meaning to if he had detached + them from the main body and repeated them slowly, went swirling down the + stream and were lost for ever. + </p> + <p> + “Stop him!” said Sally firmly. + </p> + <p> + The red-haired young man looked as a native of Johnstown might have looked + on being requested to stop that city's celebrated flood. + </p> + <p> + “Stop him?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes. Blow a whistle or something.” + </p> + <p> + Out of the depths of the young man's memory there swam to the surface a + single word—a word which he must have heard somewhere or read + somewhere: a legacy, perhaps, from long-vanished school-days. + </p> + <p> + “Zut!” he barked, and instantaneously Jules turned himself off at the + main. There was a moment of dazed silence, such as might occur in a + boiler-factory if the works suddenly shut down. + </p> + <p> + “Quick! Now you've got him!” cried Sally. “Ask him what he's talking about—if + he knows, which I doubt—and tell him to speak slowly. Then we shall + get somewhere.” + </p> + <p> + The young man nodded intelligently. The advice was good. + </p> + <p> + “Lentement,” he said. “Parlez lentement. Pas si—you know what I mean—pas + si dashed vite!” + </p> + <p> + “Ah-a-ah!” cried Jules, catching the idea on the fly. “Lentement. Ah, oui, + lentement.” + </p> + <p> + There followed a lengthy conversation which, while conveying nothing to + Sally, seemed intelligible to the red-haired linguist. + </p> + <p> + “The silly ass,” he was able to announce some few minutes later, “has made + a bloomer. Apparently he was half asleep when we came in, and he shoved us + into the lift and slammed the door, forgetting that he had left the keys + on the desk.” + </p> + <p> + “I see,” said Sally. “So we're shut in?” + </p> + <p> + “I'm afraid so. I wish to goodness,” said the young man, “I knew French + well. I'd curse him with some vim and not a little animation, the chump! I + wonder what 'blighter' is in French,” he said, meditating. + </p> + <p> + “It's the merest suggestion,” said Sally, “but oughtn't we to do + something?” + </p> + <p> + “What could we do?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, for one thing, we might all utter a loud yell. It would scare most + of the people in the hotel to death, but there might be a survivor or two + who would come and investigate and let us out.” + </p> + <p> + “What a ripping idea!” said the young man, impressed. + </p> + <p> + “I'm glad you like it. Now tell him the main out-line, or he'll think + we've gone mad.” + </p> + <p> + The young man searched for words, and eventually found some which + expressed his meaning lamely but well enough to cause Jules to nod in a + depressed sort of way. + </p> + <p> + “Fine!” said Sally. “Now, all together at the word 'three.' One—two—Oh, + poor darling!” she broke off. “Look at him!” + </p> + <p> + In the far corner of the lift, the emotional Jules was sobbing silently + into the bunch of cotton-waste which served him in the office of a + pocket-handkerchief. His broken-hearted gulps echoed hollowly down the + shaft. + </p> + <p> + 5 + </p> + <p> + In these days of cheap books of instruction on every subject under the + sun, we most of us know how to behave in the majority of life's little + crises. We have only ourselves to blame if we are ignorant of what to do + before the doctor comes, of how to make a dainty winter coat for baby out + of father's last year's under-vest and of the best method of coping with + the cold mutton. But nobody yet has come forward with practical advice as + to the correct method of behaviour to be adopted when a lift-attendant + starts crying. And Sally and her companion, as a consequence, for a few + moments merely stared at each other helplessly. + </p> + <p> + “Poor darling!” said Sally, finding speech. “Ask him what's the matter.” + </p> + <p> + The young man looked at her doubtfully. + </p> + <p> + “You know,” he said, “I don't enjoy chatting with this blighter. I mean to + say, it's a bit of an effort. I don't know why it is, but talking French + always makes me feel as if my nose were coming off. Couldn't we just leave + him to have his cry out by himself?” + </p> + <p> + “The idea!” said Sally. “Have you no heart? Are you one of those fiends in + human shape?” + </p> + <p> + He turned reluctantly to Jules, and paused to overhaul his vocabulary. + </p> + <p> + “You ought to be thankful for this chance,” said Sally. “It's the only + real way of learning French, and you're getting a lesson for nothing. What + did he say then?” + </p> + <p> + “Something about losing something, it seemed to me. I thought I caught the + word perdu.” + </p> + <p> + “But that means a partridge, doesn't it? I'm sure I've seen it on the + menus.” + </p> + <p> + “Would he talk about partridges at a time like this?” + </p> + <p> + “He might. The French are extraordinary people.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, I'll have another go at him. But he's a difficult chap to chat + with. If you give him the least encouragement, he sort of goes off like a + rocket.” He addressed another question to the sufferer, and listened + attentively to the voluble reply. + </p> + <p> + “Oh!” he said with sudden enlightenment. “Your job?” He turned to Sally. + “I got it that time,” he said. “The trouble is, he says, that if we yell + and rouse the house, we'll get out all right, but he will lose his job, + because this is the second time this sort of thing has happened, and they + warned him last time that once more would mean the push.” + </p> + <p> + “Then we mustn't dream of yelling,” said Sally, decidedly. “It means a + pretty long wait, you know. As far as I can gather, there's just a chance + of somebody else coming in later, in which case he could let us out. But + it's doubtful. He rather thinks that everybody has gone to roost.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, we must try it. I wouldn't think of losing the poor man his job. + Tell him to take the car down to the ground-floor, and then we'll just sit + and amuse ourselves till something happens. We've lots to talk about. We + can tell each other the story of our lives.” + </p> + <p> + Jules, cheered by his victims' kindly forbearance, lowered the car to the + ground floor, where, after a glance of infinite longing at the keys on the + distant desk, the sort of glance which Moses must have cast at the + Promised Land from the summit of Mount Pisgah, he sagged down in a heap + and resumed his slumbers. Sally settled herself as comfortably as possible + in her corner. + </p> + <p> + “You'd better smoke,” she said. “It will be something to do.” + </p> + <p> + “Thanks awfully.” + </p> + <p> + “And now,” said Sally, “tell me why Scrymgeour fired you.” + </p> + <p> + Little by little, under the stimulating influence of this nocturnal + adventure, the red-haired young man had lost that shy confusion which had + rendered him so ill at ease when he had encountered Sally in the hall of + the hotel; but at this question embarrassment gripped him once more. + Another of those comprehensive blushes of his raced over his face, and he + stammered. + </p> + <p> + “I say, I'm glad... I'm fearfully sorry about that, you know!” + </p> + <p> + “About Scrymgeour?” + </p> + <p> + “You know what I mean. I mean, about making such a most ghastly ass of + myself this morning. I... I never dreamed you understood English.” + </p> + <p> + “Why, I didn't object. I thought you were very nice and complimentary. Of + course, I don't know how many girls you've seen in your life, but...” + </p> + <p> + “No, I say, don't! It makes me feel such a chump.” + </p> + <p> + “And I'm sorry about my mouth. It is wide. But I know you're a fair-minded + man and realize that it isn't my fault.” + </p> + <p> + “Don't rub it in,” pleaded the young man. “As a matter of fact, if you + want to know, I think your mouth is absolutely perfect. I think,” he + proceeded, a little feverishly, “that you are the most indescribable + topper that ever...” + </p> + <p> + “You were going to tell me about Scrymgeour,” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + The young man blinked as if he had collided with some hard object while + sleep-walking. Eloquence had carried him away. + </p> + <p> + “Scrymgeour?” he said. “Oh, that would bore you.” + </p> + <p> + “Don't be silly,” said Sally reprovingly. “Can't you realize that we're + practically castaways on a desert island? There's nothing to do till + to-morrow but talk about ourselves. I want to hear all about you, and then + I'll tell you all about myself. If you feel diffident about starting the + revelations, I'll begin. Better start with names. Mine is Sally Nicholas. + What's yours?” + </p> + <p> + “Mine? Oh, ah, yes, I see what you mean.” + </p> + <p> + “I thought you would. I put it as clearly as I could. Well, what is it?” + </p> + <p> + “Kemp.” + </p> + <p> + “And the first name?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, as a matter of fact,” said the young man, “I've always rather + hushed up my first name, because when I was christened they worked a + low-down trick on me!” + </p> + <p> + “You can't shock me,” said Sally, encouragingly. “My father's name was + Ezekiel, and I've a brother who was christened Fillmore.” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Kemp brightened. “Well, mine isn't as bad as that... No, I don't mean + that,” he broke off apologetically. “Both awfully jolly names, of + course...” + </p> + <p> + “Get on,” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + “Well, they called me Lancelot. And, of course, the thing is that I don't + look like a Lancelot and never shall. My pals,” he added in a more + cheerful strain, “call me Ginger.” + </p> + <p> + “I don't blame them,” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + “Perhaps you wouldn't mind thinking of me as Ginger?'' suggested the young + man diffidently. + </p> + <p> + “Certainly.” + </p> + <p> + “That's awfully good of you.” + </p> + <p> + “Not at all.” + </p> + <p> + Jules stirred in his sleep and grunted. No other sound came to disturb the + stillness of the night. + </p> + <p> + “You were going to tell me about yourself?” said Mr. Lancelot (Ginger) + Kemp. + </p> + <p> + “I'm going to tell you all about myself,” said Sally, “not because I think + it will interest you...” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, it will!” + </p> + <p> + “Not, I say, because I think it will interest you...” + </p> + <p> + “It will, really.” + </p> + <p> + Sally looked at him coldly. + </p> + <p> + “Is this a duet?” she inquired, “or have I the floor?” + </p> + <p> + “I'm awfully sorry.” + </p> + <p> + “Not, I repeat for the third time, because I think It will interest you, + but because if I do you won't have any excuse for not telling me your + life-history, and you wouldn't believe how inquisitive I am. Well, in the + first place, I live in America. I'm over here on a holiday. And it's the + first real holiday I've had in three years—since I left home, in + fact.” Sally paused. “I ran away from home,” she said. + </p> + <p> + “Good egg!” said Ginger Kemp. + </p> + <p> + “I beg your pardon?” + </p> + <p> + “I mean, quite right. I bet you were quite right.” + </p> + <p> + “When I say home,” Sally went on, “it was only a sort of imitation home, + you know. One of those just-as-good homes which are never as satisfactory + as the real kind. My father and mother both died a good many years ago. My + brother and I were dumped down on the reluctant doorstep of an uncle.” + </p> + <p> + “Uncles,” said Ginger Kemp, feelingly, “are the devil. I've got an... but + I'm interrupting you.” + </p> + <p> + “My uncle was our trustee. He had control of all my brother's money and + mine till I was twenty-one. My brother was to get his when he was + twenty-five. My poor father trusted him blindly, and what do you think + happened?” + </p> + <p> + “Good Lord! The blighter embezzled the lot?” + </p> + <p> + “No, not a cent. Wasn't it extraordinary! Have you ever heard of a blindly + trusted uncle who was perfectly honest? Well, mine was. But the trouble + was that, while an excellent man to have looking after one's money, he + wasn't a very lovable character. He was very hard. Hard! He was as hard as—well, + nearly as hard as this seat. He hated poor Fill...” + </p> + <p> + “Phil?” + </p> + <p> + “I broke it to you just now that my brother's name was Fillmore.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, your brother. Oh, ah, yes.” + </p> + <p> + “He was always picking on poor Fill. And I'm bound to say that Fill rather + laid himself out as what you might call a pickee. He was always getting + into trouble. One day, about three years ago, he was expelled from + Harvard, and my uncle vowed he would have nothing more to do with him. So + I said, if Fill left, I would leave. And, as this seemed to be my uncle's + idea of a large evening, no objection was raised, and Fill and I departed. + We went to New York, and there we've been ever since. About six months' + ago Fill passed the twenty-five mark and collected his money, and last + month I marched past the given point and got mine. So it all ends happily, + you see. Now tell me about yourself.” + </p> + <p> + “But, I say, you know, dash it, you've skipped a lot. I mean to say, you + must have had an awful time in New York, didn't you? How on earth did you + get along?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, we found work. My brother tried one or two things, and finally became + an assistant stage-manager with some theatre people. The only thing I + could do, having been raised in enervating luxury, was ballroom dancing, + so I ball-room danced. I got a job at a place in Broadway called 'The + Flower Garden' as what is humorously called an 'instructress,' as if + anybody could 'instruct' the men who came there. One was lucky if one + saved one's life and wasn't quashed to death.” + </p> + <p> + “How perfectly foul!” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I don't know. It was rather fun for a while. Still,” said Sally, + meditatively, “I'm not saying I could have held out much longer: I was + beginning to give. I suppose I've been trampled underfoot by more fat men + than any other girl of my age in America. I don't know why it was, but + every man who came in who was a bit overweight seemed to make for me by + instinct. That's why I like to sit on the sands here and watch these + Frenchmen bathing. It's just heavenly to lie back and watch a two hundred + and fifty pound man, coming along and feel that he isn't going to dance + with me.” + </p> + <p> + “But, I say! How absolutely rotten it must have been for you!” + </p> + <p> + “Well, I'll tell you one thing. It's going to make me a very domesticated + wife one of these days. You won't find me gadding about in gilded + jazz-palaces! For me, a little place in the country somewhere, with my + knitting and an Elsie book, and bed at half-past nine! And now tell me the + story of your life. And make it long because I'm perfectly certain there's + going to be no relief-expedition. I'm sure the last dweller under this + roof came in years ago. We shall be here till morning.” + </p> + <p> + “I really think we had better shout, you know.” + </p> + <p> + “And lose Jules his job? Never!” + </p> + <p> + “Well, of course, I'm sorry for poor old Jules' troubles, but I hate to + think of you having to...” + </p> + <p> + “Now get on with the story,” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + 6 + </p> + <p> + Ginger Kemp exhibited some of the symptoms of a young bridegroom called + upon at a wedding-breakfast to respond to the toast. He moved his feet + restlessly and twisted his fingers. + </p> + <p> + “I hate talking about myself, you know,” he said. + </p> + <p> + “So I supposed,” said Sally. “That's why I gave you my autobiography + first, to give you no chance of backing out. Don't be such a shrinking + violet. We're all shipwrecked mariners here. I am intensely interested in + your narrative. And, even if I wasn't, I'd much rather listen to it than + to Jules' snoring.” + </p> + <p> + “He is snoring a bit, what? Does it annoy you? Shall I stir him?” + </p> + <p> + “You seem to have an extraordinary brutal streak in your nature,” said + Sally. “You appear to think of nothing else but schemes for harassing poor + Jules. Leave him alone for a second, and start telling me about yourself.” + </p> + <p> + “Where shall I start?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, not with your childhood, I think. We'll skip that.” + </p> + <p> + “Well...” Ginger Kemp knitted his brow, searching for a dramatic opening. + “Well, I'm more or less what you might call an orphan, like you. I mean to + say, both my people are dead and all that sort of thing.” + </p> + <p> + “Thanks for explaining. That has made it quite clear.” + </p> + <p> + “I can't remember my mother. My father died when I was in my last year at + Cambridge. I'd been having a most awfully good time at the 'varsity,'” + said Ginger, warming to his theme. “Not thick, you know, but good. I'd got + my rugger and boxing blues and I'd just been picked for scrum-half for + England against the North in the first trial match, and between ourselves + it really did look as if I was more or less of a snip for my + international.” + </p> + <p> + Sally gazed at him wide eyed. + </p> + <p> + “Is that good or bad?” she asked. + </p> + <p> + “Eh?” + </p> + <p> + “Are you reciting a catalogue of your crimes, or do you expect me to get + up and cheer? What is a rugger blue, to start with?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, it's... it's a rugger blue, you know.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I see,” said Sally. “You mean a rugger blue.” + </p> + <p> + “I mean to say, I played rugger—footer—that's to say, football—Rugby + football—for Cambridge, against Oxford. I was scrum-half.” + </p> + <p> + “And what is a scrum-half?” asked Sally, patiently. “Yes, I know you're + going to say it's a scrum-half, but can't you make it easier?” + </p> + <p> + “The scrum-half,” said Ginger, “is the half who works the scrum. He slings + the pill out to the fly-half, who starts the three-quarters going. I don't + know if you understand?” + </p> + <p> + “I don't.” + </p> + <p> + “It's dashed hard to explain,” said Ginger Kemp, unhappily. “I mean, I + don't think I've ever met anyone before who didn't know what a scrum-half + was.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, I can see that it has something to do with football, so we'll leave + it at that. I suppose it's something like our quarter-back. And what's an + international?” + </p> + <p> + “It's called getting your international when you play for England, you + know. England plays Wales, France, Ireland, and Scotland. If it hadn't + been for the smash, I think I should have played for England against + Wales.” + </p> + <p> + “I see at last. What you're trying to tell me is that you were very good + at football.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger Kemp blushed warmly. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I don't say that. England was pretty short of scrum-halves that + year.” + </p> + <p> + “What a horrible thing to happen to a country! Still, you were likely to + be picked on the All-England team when the smash came? What was the + smash?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, it turned out that the poor old pater hadn't left a penny. I never + understood the process exactly, but I'd always supposed that we were + pretty well off; and then it turned out that I hadn't anything at all. I'm + bound to say it was a bit of a jar. I had to come down from Cambridge and + go to work in my uncle's office. Of course, I made an absolute hash of + it.” + </p> + <p> + “Why, of course?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, I'm not a very clever sort of chap, you see. I somehow didn't seem + able to grasp the workings. After about a year, my uncle, getting a bit + fed-up, hoofed me out and got me a mastership at a school, and I made a + hash of that. He got me one or two other jobs, and I made a hash of + those.” + </p> + <p> + “You certainly do seem to be one of our most prominent young hashers!” + gasped Sally. + </p> + <p> + “I am,” said Ginger, modestly. + </p> + <p> + There was a silence. + </p> + <p> + “And what about Scrymgeour?” Sally asked. + </p> + <p> + “That was the last of the jobs,” said Ginger. “Scrymgeour is a pompous old + ass who thinks he's going to be Prime Minister some day. He's a big bug at + the Bar and has just got into Parliament. My cousin used to devil for him. + That's how I got mixed up with the blighter.” + </p> + <p> + “Your cousin used...? I wish you would talk English.” + </p> + <p> + “That was my cousin who was with me on the beach this morning.” + </p> + <p> + “And what did you say he used to do for Mr. Scrymgeour?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, it's called devilling. My cousin's at the Bar, too—one of our + rising nibs, as a matter of fact...” + </p> + <p> + “I thought he was a lawyer of some kind.” + </p> + <p> + “He's got a long way beyond it now, but when he started he used to devil + for Scrymgeour—assist him, don't you know. His name's Carmyle, you + know. Perhaps you've heard of him? He's rather a prominent johnny in his + way. Bruce Carmyle, you know.” + </p> + <p> + “I haven't.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, he got me this job of secretary to Scrymgeour.” + </p> + <p> + “And why did Mr. Scrymgeour fire you?” + </p> + <p> + Ginger Kemp's face darkened. He frowned. Sally, watching him, felt that + she had been right when she had guessed that he had a temper. She liked + him none the worse for it. Mild men did not appeal to her. + </p> + <p> + “I don't know if you're fond of dogs?” said Ginger. + </p> + <p> + “I used to be before this morning,” said Sally. “And I suppose I shall be + again in time. For the moment I've had what you might call rather a + surfeit of dogs. But aren't you straying from the point? I asked you why + Mr. Scrymgeour dismissed you.” + </p> + <p> + “I'm telling you.” + </p> + <p> + “I'm glad of that. I didn't know.” + </p> + <p> + “The old brute,” said Ginger, frowning again, “has a dog. A very jolly + little spaniel. Great pal of mine. And Scrymgeour is the sort of fool who + oughtn't to be allowed to own a dog. He's one of those asses who isn't fit + to own a dog. As a matter of fact, of all the blighted, pompous, bullying, + shrivelled-souled old devils...” + </p> + <p> + “One moment,” said Sally. “I'm getting an impression that you don't like + Mr. Scrymgeour. Am I right?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes!” + </p> + <p> + “I thought so. Womanly intuition! Go on.” + </p> + <p> + “He used to insist on the poor animal doing tricks. I hate seeing a dog do + tricks. Dogs loathe it, you know. They're frightfully sensitive. Well, + Scrymgeour used to make this spaniel of his do tricks—fool-things + that no self-respecting dogs would do: and eventually poor old Billy got + fed up and jibbed. He was too polite to bite, but he sort of shook his + head and crawled under a chair. You'd have thought anyone would have let + it go at that, but would old Scrymgeour? Not a bit of it! Of all the + poisonous...” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, I know. Go on.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, the thing ended in the blighter hauling him out from under the + chair and getting more and more shirty, until finally he laid into him + with a stick. That is to say,” said Ginger, coldly accurate, “he started + laying into him with a stick.” He brooded for a moment with knit brows. “A + spaniel, mind you! Can you imagine anyone beating a spaniel? It's like + hitting a little girl. Well, he's a fairly oldish man, you know, and that + hampered me a bit: but I got hold of the stick and broke it into about + eleven pieces, and by great good luck it was a stick he happened to value + rather highly. It had a gold knob and had been presented to him by his + constituents or something. I minced it up a goodish bit, and then I told + him a fair amount about himself. And then—well, after that he shot + me out, and I came here.” + </p> + <p> + Sally did not speak for a moment. + </p> + <p> + “You were quite right,” she said at last, in a sober voice that had + nothing in it of her customary flippancy. She paused again. “And what are + you going to do now?” she said. + </p> + <p> + “I don't know.” + </p> + <p> + “You'll get something?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, yes, I shall get something, I suppose. The family will be pretty + sick, of course.” + </p> + <p> + “For goodness' sake! Why do you bother about the family?” Sally burst out. + She could not reconcile this young man's flabby dependence on his family + with the enterprise and vigour which he had shown in his dealings with the + unspeakable Scrymgeour. Of course, he had been brought up to look on + himself as a rich man's son and appeared to have drifted as such young men + are wont to do; but even so... “The whole trouble with you,” she said, + embarking on a subject on which she held strong views, “is that...” + </p> + <p> + Her harangue was interrupted by what—at the Normandie, at one + o'clock in the morning—practically amounted to a miracle. The front + door of the hotel opened, and there entered a young man in evening dress. + Such persons were sufficiently rare at the Normandie, which catered + principally for the staid and middle-aged, and this youth's presence was + due, if one must pause to explain it, to the fact that, in the middle of + his stay at Roville, a disastrous evening at the Casino had so diminished + his funds that he had been obliged to make a hurried shift from the Hotel + Splendide to the humbler Normandie. His late appearance to-night was + caused by the fact that he had been attending a dance at the Splendide, + principally in the hope of finding there some kind-hearted friend of his + prosperity from whom he might borrow. + </p> + <p> + A rapid-fire dialogue having taken place between Jules and the newcomer, + the keys were handed through the cage, the door opened and the lift was + set once more in motion. And a few minutes later, Sally, suddenly aware of + an overpowering sleepiness, had switched off her light and jumped into + bed. Her last waking thought was a regret that she had not been able to + speak at length to Mr. Ginger Kemp on the subject of enterprise, and + resolve that the address should be delivered at the earliest opportunity. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0003" id="link2HCH0003"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER III. THE DIGNIFIED MR. CARMYLE + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + By six o'clock on the following evening, however, Sally had been forced to + the conclusion that Ginger would have to struggle through life as best he + could without the assistance of her contemplated remarks: for she had seen + nothing of him all day and in another hour she would have left Roville on + the seven-fifteen express which was to take her to Paris, en route for + Cherbourg and the liner whereon she had booked her passage for New York. + </p> + <p> + It was in the faint hope of finding him even now that, at half-past six, + having conveyed her baggage to the station and left it in charge of an + amiable porter, she paid a last visit to the Casino Municipale. She + disliked the thought of leaving Ginger without having uplifted him. Like + so many alert and active-minded girls, she possessed in a great degree the + quality of interesting herself in—or, as her brother Fillmore + preferred to put it, messing about with—the private affairs of + others. Ginger had impressed her as a man to whom it was worth while to + give a friendly shove on the right path; and it was with much + gratification, therefore, that, having entered the Casino, she perceived a + flaming head shining through the crowd which had gathered at one of the + roulette-tables. + </p> + <p> + There are two Casinos at Roville-sur-Mer. The one on the Promenade goes in + mostly for sea-air and a mild game called boule. It is the big Casino + Municipale down in the Palace Massena near the railway station which is + the haunt of the earnest gambler who means business; and it was plain to + Sally directly she arrived that Ginger Kemp not only meant business but + was getting results. Ginger was going extremely strong. He was entrenched + behind an opulent-looking mound of square counters: and, even as Sally + looked, a wooden-faced croupier shoved a further instalment across the + table to him at the end of his long rake. + </p> + <p> + “Epatant!” murmured a wistful man at Sally's side, removing an elbow from + her ribs in order the better to gesticulate. Sally, though no French + scholar, gathered that he was startled and gratified. The entire crowd + seemed to be startled and gratified. There is undoubtedly a certain + altruism in the make-up of the spectators at a Continental roulette-table. + They seem to derive a spiritual pleasure from seeing somebody else win. + </p> + <p> + The croupier gave his moustache a twist with his left hand and the wheel a + twist with his right, and silence fell again. Sally, who had shifted to a + spot where the pressure of the crowd was less acute, was now able to see + Ginger's face, and as she saw it she gave an involuntary laugh. He looked + exactly like a dog at a rat-hole. His hair seemed to bristle with + excitement. One could almost fancy that his ears were pricked up. + </p> + <p> + In the tense hush which had fallen on the crowd at the restarting of the + wheel, Sally's laugh rang out with an embarrassing clearness. It had a + marked effect on all those within hearing. There is something almost of + religious ecstasy in the deportment of the spectators at a table where + anyone is having a run of luck at roulette, and if she had guffawed in a + cathedral she could not have caused a more pained consternation. The + earnest worshippers gazed at her with shocked eyes, and Ginger, turning + with a start, saw her and jumped up. As he did so, the ball fell with a + rattling click into a red compartment of the wheel; and, as it ceased to + revolve and it was seen that at last the big winner had picked the wrong + colour, a shuddering groan ran through the congregation like that which + convulses the penitents' bench at a negro revival meeting. More glances of + reproach were cast at Sally. It was generally felt that her injudicious + behaviour had changed Ginger's luck. + </p> + <p> + The only person who did not appear to be concerned was Ginger himself. He + gathered up his loot, thrust it into his pocket, and elbowed his way to + where Sally stood, now definitely established in the eyes of the crowd as + a pariah. There was universal regret that he had decided to call it a day. + It was to the spectators as though a star had suddenly walked off the + stage in the middle of his big scene; and not even a loud and violent + quarrel which sprang up at this moment between two excitable gamblers over + a disputed five-franc counter could wholly console them. + </p> + <p> + “I say,” said Ginger, dexterously plucking Sally out of the crowd, “this + is topping, meeting you like this. I've been looking for you everywhere.” + </p> + <p> + “It's funny you didn't find me, then, for that's where I've been. I was + looking for you.” + </p> + <p> + “No, really?” Ginger seemed pleased. He led the way to the quiet ante-room + outside the gambling-hall, and they sat down in a corner. It was pleasant + here, with nobody near except the gorgeously uniformed attendant over by + the door. “That was awfully good of you.” + </p> + <p> + “I felt I must have a talk with you before my train went.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger started violently. + </p> + <p> + “Your train? What do you mean?” + </p> + <p> + “The puff-puff,” explained Sally. “I'm leaving to-night, you know.” + </p> + <p> + “Leaving?” Ginger looked as horrified as the devoutest of the congregation + of which Sally had just ceased to be a member. “You don't mean leaving? + You're not going away from Roville?” + </p> + <p> + “I'm afraid so.” + </p> + <p> + “But why? Where are you going?” + </p> + <p> + “Back to America. My boat sails from Cherbourg tomorrow.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, my aunt!” + </p> + <p> + “I'm sorry,” said Sally, touched by his concern. She was a warm-hearted + girl and liked being appreciated. “But...” + </p> + <p> + “I say...” Ginger Kemp turned bright scarlet and glared before him at the + uniformed official, who was regarding their tête-à -tête with the indulgent + eye of one who has been through this sort of thing himself. “I say, look + here, will you marry me?” + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + Sally stared at his vermilion profile in frank amazement. Ginger, she had + realized by this time, was in many ways a surprising young man, but she + had not expected him to be as surprising as this. + </p> + <p> + “Marry you!” + </p> + <p> + “You know what I mean.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, yes, I suppose I do. You allude to the holy state. Yes, I know what + you mean.” + </p> + <p> + “Then how about it?” + </p> + <p> + Sally began to regain her composure. Her sense of humour was tickled. She + looked at Ginger gravely. He did not meet her eye, but continued to drink + in the uniformed official, who was by now so carried away by the romance + of it all that he had begun to hum a love-ballad under his breath. The + official could not hear what they were saying, and would not have been + able to understand it even if he could have heard; but he was an expert in + the language of the eyes. + </p> + <p> + “But isn't this—don't think I am trying to make difficulties—isn't + this a little sudden?” + </p> + <p> + “It's got to be sudden,” said Ginger Kemp, complainingly. “I thought you + were going to be here for weeks.” + </p> + <p> + “But, my infant, my babe, has it occurred to you that we are practically + strangers?” She patted his hand tolerantly, causing the uniformed official + to heave a tender sigh. “I see what has happened,” she said. “You're + mistaking me for some other girl, some girl you know really well, and were + properly introduced to. Take a good look at me, and you'll see.” + </p> + <p> + “If I take a good look at you,” said Ginger, feverishly, “I'm dashed if + I'll answer for the consequences.” + </p> + <p> + “And this is the man I was going to lecture on 'Enterprise.'” + </p> + <p> + “You're the most wonderful girl I've ever met, dash it!” said Ginger, his + gaze still riveted on the official by the door “I dare say it is sudden. I + can't help that. I fell in love with you the moment I saw you, and there + you are!” + </p> + <p> + “But...” + </p> + <p> + “Now, look here, I know I'm not much of a chap and all that, but... well, + I've just won the deuce of a lot of money in there...” + </p> + <p> + “Would you buy me with your gold?” + </p> + <p> + “I mean to say, we should have enough to start on, and... of course I've + made an infernal hash of everything I've tried up till now, but there must + be something I can do, and you can jolly well bet I'd have a goodish stab + at it. I mean to say, with you to buck me up and so forth, don't you know. + Well, I mean...” + </p> + <p> + “Has it struck you that I may already be engaged to someone else?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, golly! Are you?” + </p> + <p> + For the first time he turned and faced her, and there was a look in his + eyes which touched Sally and drove all sense of the ludicrous out of her. + Absurd as it was, this man was really serious. + </p> + <p> + “Well, yes, as a matter of fact I am,” she said soberly. + </p> + <p> + Ginger Kemp bit his lip and for a moment was silent. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, well, that's torn it!” he said at last. + </p> + <p> + Sally was aware of an emotion too complex to analyse. There was pity in + it, but amusement too. The emotion, though she did not recognize it, was + maternal. Mothers, listening to their children pleading with engaging + absurdity for something wholly out of their power to bestow, feel that + same wavering between tears and laughter. Sally wanted to pick Ginger up + and kiss him. The one thing she could not do was to look on him, sorry as + she was for him, as a reasonable, grown-up man. + </p> + <p> + “You don't really mean it, you know.” + </p> + <p> + “Don't I!” said Ginger, hollowly. “Oh, don't I!” + </p> + <p> + “You can't! There isn't such a thing in real life as love at first sight. + Love's a thing that comes when you know a person well and...” She paused. + It had just occurred to her that she was hardly the girl to lecture in + this strain. Her love for Gerald Foster had been sufficiently sudden, even + instantaneous. What did she know of Gerald except that she loved him? They + had become engaged within two weeks of their first meeting. She found this + recollection damping to her eloquence, and ended by saying tamely: + </p> + <p> + “It's ridiculous.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger had simmered down to a mood of melancholy resignation. + </p> + <p> + “I couldn't have expected you to care for me, I suppose, anyway,” he said, + sombrely. “I'm not much of a chap.” + </p> + <p> + It was just the diversion from the theme under discussion which Sally had + been longing to find. She welcomed the chance of continuing the + conversation on a less intimate and sentimental note. + </p> + <p> + “That's exactly what I wanted to talk to you about,” she said, seizing the + opportunity offered by this display of humility. “I've been looking for + you all day to go on with what I was starting to say in the lift last + night when we were interrupted. Do you mind if I talk to you like an aunt—or + a sister, suppose we say? Really, the best plan would be for you to adopt + me as an honorary sister. What do you think?” + </p> + <p> + Ginger did not appear noticeably elated at the suggested relationship. + </p> + <p> + “Because I really do take a tremendous interest in you.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger brightened. “That's awfully good of you.” + </p> + <p> + “I'm going to speak words of wisdom. Ginger, why don't you brace up?” + </p> + <p> + “Brace up?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, stiffen your backbone and stick out your chin, and square your + elbows, and really amount to something. Why do you simply flop about and + do nothing and leave everything to what you call 'the family'? Why do you + have to be helped all the time? Why don't you help yourself? Why do you + have to have jobs found for you? Why don't you rush out and get one? Why + do you have to worry about what, 'the family' thinks of you? Why don't you + make yourself independent of them? I know you had hard luck, suddenly + finding yourself without money and all that, but, good heavens, everybody + else in the world who has ever done anything has been broke at one time or + another. It's part of the fun. You'll never get anywhere by letting + yourself be picked up by the family like... like a floppy Newfoundland + puppy and dumped down in any old place that happens to suit them. A job's + a thing you've got to choose for yourself and get for yourself. Think what + you can do—there must be something—and then go at it with a + snort and grab it and hold it down and teach it to take a joke. You've + managed to collect some money. It will give you time to look round. And, + when you've had a look round, do something! Try to realize you're alive, + and try to imagine the family isn't!” + </p> + <p> + Sally stopped and drew a deep breath. Ginger Kemp did not reply for a + moment. He seemed greatly impressed. + </p> + <p> + “When you talk quick,” he said at length, in a serious meditative voice, + “your nose sort of goes all squiggly. Ripping, it looks!” + </p> + <p> + Sally uttered an indignant cry. + </p> + <p> + “Do you mean to say you haven't been listening to a word I've been + saying,” she demanded. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, rather! Oh, by Jove, yes.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, what did I say?” + </p> + <p> + “You... er... And your eyes sort of shine, too.” + </p> + <p> + “Never mind my eyes. What did I say?” + </p> + <p> + “You told me,” said Ginger, on reflection, “to get a job.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, yes. I put it much better than that, but that's what it amounted + to, I suppose. All right, then. I'm glad you...” + </p> + <p> + Ginger was eyeing her with mournful devotion. “I say,” he interrupted, “I + wish you'd let me write to you. Letters, I mean, and all that. I have an + idea it would kind of buck me up.” + </p> + <p> + “You won't have time for writing letters.” + </p> + <p> + “I'll have time to write them to you. You haven't an address or anything + of that sort in America, have you, by any chance? I mean, so that I'd know + where to write to.” + </p> + <p> + “I can give you an address which will always find me.” She told him the + number and street of Mrs. Meecher's boarding-house, and he wrote them down + reverently on his shirt-cuff. “Yes, on second thoughts, do write,” she + said. “Of course, I shall want to know how you've got on. I... oh, my + goodness! That clock's not right?” + </p> + <p> + “Just about. What time does your train go?” + </p> + <p> + “Go! It's gone! Or, at least, it goes in about two seconds.” She made a + rush for the swing-door, to the confusion of the uniformed official who + had not been expecting this sudden activity. “Good-bye, Ginger. Write to + me, and remember what I said.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger, alert after his unexpected fashion when it became a question of + physical action, had followed her through the swing-door, and they emerged + together and started running down the square. + </p> + <p> + “Stick it!” said Ginger, encouragingly. He was running easily and well, as + becomes a man who, in his day, had been a snip for his international at + scrum-half. + </p> + <p> + Sally saved her breath. The train was beginning to move slowly out of the + station as they sprinted abreast on to the platform. Ginger dived for the + nearest door, wrenched it open, gathered Sally neatly in his arms, and + flung her in. She landed squarely on the toes of a man who occupied the + corner seat, and, bounding off again, made for the window. Ginger, + faithful to the last, was trotting beside the train as it gathered speed. + </p> + <p> + “Ginger! My poor porter! Tip him. I forgot.” + </p> + <p> + “Right ho!” + </p> + <p> + “And don't forget what I've been saying.” + </p> + <p> + “Right ho!” + </p> + <p> + “Look after yourself and 'Death to the Family!'” + </p> + <p> + “Right ho!” + </p> + <p> + The train passed smoothly out of the station. Sally cast one last look + back at her red-haired friend, who had now halted and was waving a + handkerchief. Then she turned to apologize to the other occupant of the + carriage. + </p> + <p> + “I'm so sorry,” she said, breathlessly. “I hope I didn't hurt you.” + </p> + <p> + She found herself facing Ginger's cousin, the dark man of yesterday's + episode on the beach, Bruce Carmyle. + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + Mr. Carmyle was not a man who readily allowed himself to be disturbed by + life's little surprises, but at the present moment he could not help + feeling slightly dazed. He recognized Sally now as the French girl who had + attracted his cousin Lancelot's notice on the beach. At least he had + assumed that she was French, and it was startling to be addressed by her + now in fluent English. How had she suddenly acquired this gift of tongues? + And how on earth had she had time since yesterday, when he had been a + total stranger to her, to become sufficiently intimate with Cousin + Lancelot to be sprinting with him down station platforms and addressing + him out of railway-carriage windows as Ginger? Bruce Carmyle was aware + that most members of that sub-species of humanity, his cousin's personal + friends, called him by that familiar—and, so Carmyle held, vulgar—nickname: + but how had this girl got hold of it? + </p> + <p> + If Sally had been less pretty, Mr. Carmyle would undoubtedly have looked + disapprovingly at her, for she had given his rather rigid sense of the + proprieties a nasty jar. But as, panting and flushed from her run, she was + prettier than any girl he had yet met, he contrived to smile. + </p> + <p> + “Not at all,” he said in answer to her question, though it was far from + the truth. His left big toe was aching confoundedly. Even a girl with a + foot as small as Sally's can make her presence felt on a man's toe if the + scrum-half who is handling her aims well and uses plenty of vigour. + </p> + <p> + “If you don't mind,” said Sally, sitting down, “I think I'll breathe a + little.” + </p> + <p> + She breathed. The train sped on. + </p> + <p> + “Quite a close thing,” said Bruce Carmyle, affably. The pain in his toe + was diminishing. “You nearly missed it.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes. It was lucky Mr. Kemp was with me. He throws very straight, doesn't + he.” + </p> + <p> + “Tell me,” said Carmyle, “how do you come to know my Cousin? On the beach + yesterday morning...” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, we didn't know each other then. But we were staying at the same + hotel, and we spent an hour or so shut up in an elevator together. That + was when we really got acquainted.” + </p> + <p> + A waiter entered the compartment, announcing in unexpected English that + dinner was served in the restaurant car. “Would you care for dinner?” + </p> + <p> + “I'm starving,” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + She reproved herself, as they made their way down the corridor, for being + so foolish as to judge anyone by his appearance. This man was perfectly + pleasant in spite of his grim exterior. She had decided by the time they + had seated themselves at the table she liked him. + </p> + <p> + At the table, however, Mr. Carmyle's manner changed for the worse. He lost + his amiability. He was evidently a man who took his meals seriously and + believed in treating waiters with severity. He shuddered austerely at a + stain on the table-cloth, and then concentrated himself frowningly on the + bill of fare. Sally, meanwhile, was establishing cosy relations with the + much too friendly waiter, a cheerful old man who from the start seemed to + have made up his mind to regard her as a favourite daughter. The waiter + talked no English and Sally no French, but they were getting along + capitally, when Mr. Carmyle, who had been irritably waving aside the + servitor's light-hearted advice—at the Hotel Splendide the waiters + never bent over you and breathed cordial suggestions down the side of your + face—gave his order crisply in the Anglo-Gallic dialect of the + travelling Briton. The waiter remarked, “Boum!” in a pleased sort of way, + and vanished. + </p> + <p> + “Nice old man!” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + “Infernally familiar!” said Mr. Carmyle. + </p> + <p> + Sally perceived that on the topic of the waiter she and her host did not + see eye to eye and that little pleasure or profit could be derived from + any discussion centring about him. She changed the subject. She was not + liking Mr. Carmyle quite so much as she had done a few minutes ago, but it + was courteous of him to give her dinner, and she tried to like him as much + as she could. + </p> + <p> + “By the way,” she said, “my name is Nicholas. I always think it's a good + thing to start with names, don't you?” + </p> + <p> + “Mine...” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I know yours. Ginger—Mr. Kemp told me.” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Carmyle, who since the waiter's departure, had been thawing, stiffened + again at the mention of Ginger. + </p> + <p> + “Indeed?” he said, coldly. “Apparently you got intimate.” + </p> + <p> + Sally did not like his tone. He seemed to be criticizing her, and she + resented criticism from a stranger. Her eyes opened wide and she looked + dangerously across the table. + </p> + <p> + “Why 'apparently'? I told you that we had got intimate, and I explained + how. You can't stay shut up in an elevator half the night with anybody + without getting to know him. I found Mr. Kemp very pleasant.” + </p> + <p> + “Really?” + </p> + <p> + “And very interesting.” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Carmyle raised his eyebrows. + </p> + <p> + “Would you call him interesting?” + </p> + <p> + “I did call him interesting.” Sally was beginning to feel the exhilaration + of battle. Men usually made themselves extremely agreeable to her, and she + reacted belligerently under the stiff unfriendliness which had come over + her companion in the last few minutes. + </p> + <p> + “He told me all about himself.” + </p> + <p> + “And you found that interesting?” + </p> + <p> + “Why not?” + </p> + <p> + “Well...” A frigid half-smile came and went on Bruce Carmyle's dark face. + “My cousin has many excellent qualities, no doubt—he used to play + football well, and I understand that he is a capable amateur pugilist—but + I should not have supposed him entertaining. We find him a little dull.” + </p> + <p> + “I thought it was only royalty that called themselves 'we.'” + </p> + <p> + “I meant myself—and the rest of the family.” + </p> + <p> + The mention of the family was too much for Sally. She had to stop talking + in order to allow her mind to clear itself of rude thoughts. + </p> + <p> + “Mr. Kemp was telling me about Mr. Scrymgeour,” she went on at length. + </p> + <p> + Bruce Carmyle stared for a moment at the yard or so of French bread which + the waiter had placed on the table. + </p> + <p> + “Indeed?” he said. “He has an engaging lack of reticence.” + </p> + <p> + The waiter returned bearing soup and dumped it down. + </p> + <p> + “V'la!” he observed, with the satisfied air of a man who has successfully + performed a difficult conjuring trick. He smiled at Sally expectantly, as + though confident of applause from this section of his audience at least. + But Sally's face was set and rigid. She had been snubbed, and the + sensation was as pleasant as it was novel. + </p> + <p> + “I think Mr. Kemp had hard luck,” she said. + </p> + <p> + “If you will excuse me, I would prefer not to discuss the matter.” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Carmyle's attitude was that Sally might be a pretty girl, but she was + a stranger, and the intimate affairs of the Family were not to be + discussed with strangers, however prepossessing. + </p> + <p> + “He was quite in the right. Mr. Scrymgeour was beating a dog...” + </p> + <p> + “I've heard the details.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I didn't know that. Well, don't you agree with me, then?” + </p> + <p> + “I do not. A man who would throw away an excellent position simply + because...” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, well, if that's your view, I suppose it is useless to talk about it.” + </p> + <p> + “Quite.” + </p> + <p> + “Still, there's no harm in asking what you propose to do about Gin—about + Mr. Kemp.” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Carmyle became more glacial. + </p> + <p> + “I'm afraid I cannot discuss...” + </p> + <p> + Sally's quick impatience, nobly restrained till now, finally got the + better of her. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, for goodness' sake,” she snapped, “do try to be human, and don't + always be snubbing people. You remind me of one of those portraits of men + in the eighteenth century, with wooden faces, who look out of heavy gold + frames at you with fishy eyes as if you were a regrettable incident.” + </p> + <p> + “Rosbif,” said the waiter genially, manifesting himself suddenly beside + them as if he had popped up out of a trap. + </p> + <p> + Bruce Carmyle attacked his roast beef morosely. Sally who was in the mood + when she knew that she would be ashamed of herself later on, but was full + of battle at the moment, sat in silence. + </p> + <p> + “I am sorry,” said Mr. Carmyle ponderously, “if my eyes are fishy. The + fact has not been called to my attention before.” + </p> + <p> + “I suppose you never had any sisters,” said Sally. “They would have told + you.” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Carmyle relapsed into an offended dumbness, which lasted till the + waiter had brought the coffee. + </p> + <p> + “I think,” said Sally, getting up, “I'll be going now. I don't seem to + want any coffee, and, if I stay on, I may say something rude. I thought I + might be able to put in a good word for Mr. Kemp and save him from being + massacred, but apparently it's no use. Good-bye, Mr. Carmyle, and thank + you for giving me dinner.” + </p> + <p> + She made her way down the car, followed by Bruce Carmyle's indignant, yet + fascinated, gaze. Strange emotions were stirring in Mr. Carmyle's bosom. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0004" id="link2HCH0004"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER IV. GINGER IN DANGEROUS MOOD + </h2> + <p> + Some few days later, owing to the fact that the latter, being preoccupied, + did not see him first, Bruce Carmyle met his cousin Lancelot in + Piccadilly. They had returned by different routes from Roville, and Ginger + would have preferred the separation to continue. He was hurrying on with a + nod, when Carmyle stopped him. + </p> + <p> + “Just the man I wanted to see,” he observed. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, hullo!” said Ginger, without joy. + </p> + <p> + “I was thinking of calling at your club.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes. Cigarette?” + </p> + <p> + Ginger peered at the proffered case with the vague suspicion of the man + who has allowed himself to be lured on to the platform and is accepting a + card from the conjurer. He felt bewildered. In all the years of their + acquaintance he could not recall another such exhibition of geniality on + his cousin's part. He was surprised, indeed, at Mr. Carmyle's speaking to + him at all, for the affaire Scrymgeour remained an un-healed wound, and + the Family, Ginger knew, were even now in session upon it. + </p> + <p> + “Been back in London long?” + </p> + <p> + “Day or two.” + </p> + <p> + “I heard quite by accident that you had returned and that you were staying + at the club. By the way, thank you for introducing me to Miss Nicholas.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger started violently. + </p> + <p> + “What!” + </p> + <p> + “I was in that compartment, you know, at Roville Station. You threw her + right on top of me. We agreed to consider that an introduction. An + attractive girl.” + </p> + <p> + Bruce Carmyle had not entirely made up his mind regarding Sally, but on + one point he was clear, that she should not, if he could help it, pass out + of his life. Her abrupt departure had left him with that baffled and + dissatisfied feeling which, though it has little in common with love at + first sight, frequently produces the same effects. She had had, he could + not disguise it from himself, the better of their late encounter and he + was conscious of a desire to meet her again and show her that there was + more in him than she apparently supposed. Bruce Carmyle, in a word, was + piqued: and, though he could not quite decide whether he liked or disliked + Sally, he was very sure that a future without her would have an element of + flatness. + </p> + <p> + “A very attractive girl. We had a very pleasant talk.” + </p> + <p> + “I bet you did,” said Ginger enviously. + </p> + <p> + “By the way, she did not give you her address by any chance?” + </p> + <p> + “Why?” said Ginger suspiciously. His attitude towards Sally's address + resembled somewhat that of a connoisseur who has acquired a unique work of + art. He wanted to keep it to himself and gloat over it. + </p> + <p> + “Well, I—er—I promised to send her some books she was anxious + to read...” + </p> + <p> + “I shouldn't think she gets much time for reading.” + </p> + <p> + “Books which are not published in America.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, pretty nearly everything is published in America, what? Bound to be, + I mean.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, these particular books are not,” said Mr. Carmyle shortly. He was + finding Ginger's reserve a little trying, and wished that he had been more + inventive. + </p> + <p> + “Give them to me and I'll send them to her,” suggested Ginger. + </p> + <p> + “Good Lord, man!” snapped Mr. Carmyle. “I'm capable of sending a few books + to America. Where does she live?” + </p> + <p> + Ginger revealed the sacred number of the holy street which had the luck to + be Sally's headquarters. He did it because with a persistent devil like + his cousin there seemed no way of getting out of it: but he did it + grudgingly. + </p> + <p> + “Thanks.” Bruce Carmyle wrote the information down with a gold pencil in a + dapper little morocco-bound note-book. He was the sort of man who always + has a pencil, and the backs of old envelopes never enter into his life. + </p> + <p> + There was a pause. Bruce Carmyle coughed. + </p> + <p> + “I saw Uncle Donald this morning,” he said. + </p> + <p> + His manner had lost its geniality. There was no need for it now, and he + was a man who objected to waste. He spoke coldly, and in his voice there + was a familiar sub-tingle of reproof. + </p> + <p> + “Yes?” said Ginger moodily. This was the uncle in whose office he had made + his debut as a hasher: a worthy man, highly respected in the National + Liberal Club, but never a favourite of Ginger's. There were other minor + uncles and a few subsidiary aunts who went to make up the Family, but + Uncle Donald was unquestionably the managing director of that body and it + was Ginger's considered opinion that in this capacity he approximated to a + human blister. + </p> + <p> + “He wants you to dine with him to-night at Bleke's.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger's depression deepened. A dinner with Uncle Donald would hardly have + been a cheerful function, even in the surroundings of a banquet in the + Arabian Nights. There was that about Uncle Donald's personality which + would have cast a sobering influence over the orgies of the Emperor + Tiberius at Capri. To dine with him at a morgue like that relic of Old + London, Bleke's Coffee House, which confined its custom principally to + regular patrons who had not missed an evening there for half a century, + was to touch something very near bed-rock. Ginger was extremely doubtful + whether flesh and blood were equal to it. + </p> + <p> + “To-night?” he said. “Oh, you mean to-night? Well...” + </p> + <p> + “Don't be a fool. You know as well as I do that you've got to go.” Uncle + Donald's invitations were royal commands in the Family. “If you've another + engagement you must put it off.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, all right.” + </p> + <p> + “Seven-thirty sharp.” + </p> + <p> + “All right,” said Ginger gloomily. + </p> + <p> + The two men went their ways, Bruce Carmyle eastwards because he had + clients to see in his chambers at the Temple; Ginger westwards because Mr. + Carmyle had gone east. There was little sympathy between these cousins: + yet, oddly enough, their thoughts as they walked centred on the same + object. Bruce Carmyle, threading his way briskly through the crowds of + Piccadilly Circus, was thinking of Sally: and so was Ginger as he loafed + aimlessly towards Hyde Park Corner, bumping in a sort of coma from + pedestrian to pedestrian. + </p> + <p> + Since his return to London Ginger had been in bad shape. He mooned through + the days and slept poorly at night. If there is one thing rottener than + another in a pretty blighted world, one thing which gives a fellow the pip + and reduces him to the condition of an absolute onion, it is hopeless + love. Hopeless love had got Ginger all stirred up. His had been hitherto a + placid soul. Even the financial crash which had so altered his life had + not bruised him very deeply. His temperament had enabled him to bear the + slings and arrows of outrageous fortune with a philosophic “Right ho!” But + now everything seemed different. Things irritated him acutely, which + before he had accepted as inevitable—his Uncle Donald's moustache, + for instance, and its owner's habit of employing it during meals as a sort + of zareba or earthwork against the assaults of soup. + </p> + <p> + “By gad!” thought Ginger, stopping suddenly opposite Devonshire House. “If + he uses that damned shrubbery as soup-strainer to-night, I'll slosh him + with a fork!” + </p> + <p> + Hard thoughts... hard thoughts! And getting harder all the time, for + nothing grows more quickly than a mood of rebellion. Rebellion is a forest + fire that flames across the soul. The spark had been lighted in Ginger, + and long before he reached Hyde Park Corner he was ablaze and crackling. + By the time he returned to his club he was practically a menace to society—to + that section of it, at any rate, which embraced his Uncle Donald, his + minor uncles George and William, and his aunts Mary, Geraldine, and + Louise. + </p> + <p> + Nor had the mood passed when he began to dress for the dismal festivities + of Bleke's Coffee House. He scowled as he struggled morosely with an + obstinate tie. One cannot disguise the fact—Ginger was warming up. + And it was just at this moment that Fate, as though it had been waiting + for the psychological instant, applied the finishing touch. There was a + knock at the door, and a waiter came in with a telegram. + </p> + <p> + Ginger looked at the envelope. It had been readdressed and forwarded on + from the Hotel Normandie. It was a wireless, handed in on board the White + Star liner Olympic, and it ran as follows: + </p> + <p> + Remember. Death to the Family. S. + </p> + <p> + Ginger sat down heavily on the bed. + </p> + <p> + The driver of the taxi-cab which at twenty-five minutes past seven drew up + at the dingy door of Bleke's Coffee House in the Strand was rather struck + by his fare's manner and appearance. A determined-looking sort of young + bloke, was the taxi-driver's verdict. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0005" id="link2HCH0005"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER V. SALLY HEARS NEWS + </h2> + <p> + It had been Sally's intention, on arriving in New York, to take a room at + the St. Regis and revel in the gilded luxury to which her wealth entitled + her before moving into the small but comfortable apartment which, as soon + as she had the time, she intended to find and make her permanent abode. + But when the moment came and she was giving directions to the taxi-driver + at the dock, there seemed to her something revoltingly Fillmorian about + the scheme. It would be time enough to sever herself from the + boarding-house which had been her home for three years when she had found + the apartment. Meanwhile, the decent thing to do, if she did not want to + brand herself in the sight of her conscience as a female Fillmore, was to + go back temporarily to Mrs. Meecher's admirable establishment and + foregather with her old friends. After all, home is where the heart is, + even if there are more prunes there than the gourmet would consider + judicious. + </p> + <p> + Perhaps it was the unavoidable complacency induced by the thought that she + was doing the right thing, or possibly it was the tingling expectation of + meeting Gerald Foster again after all these weeks of separation, that made + the familiar streets seem wonderfully bright as she drove through them. It + was a perfect, crisp New York morning, all blue sky and amber sunshine, + and even the ash-cans had a stimulating look about them. The street cars + were full of happy people rollicking off to work: policemen directed the + traffic with jaunty affability: and the white-clad street-cleaners went + about their poetic tasks with a quiet but none the less noticeable relish. + It was improbable that any of these people knew that she was back, but + somehow they all seemed to be behaving as though this were a special day. + </p> + <p> + The first discordant note in this overture of happiness was struck by Mrs. + Meecher, who informed Sally, after expressing her gratification at the + news that she required her old room, that Gerald Foster had left town that + morning. + </p> + <p> + “Gone to Detroit, he has,” said Mrs. Meecher. “Miss Doland, too.” She + broke off to speak a caustic word to the boarding-house handyman, who, + with Sally's trunk as a weapon, was depreciating the value of the + wall-paper in the hall. “There's that play of his being tried out there, + you know, Monday,” resumed Mrs. Meecher, after the handyman had bumped his + way up the staircase. “They been rehearsing ever since you left.” + </p> + <p> + Sally was disappointed, but it was such a beautiful morning, and New York + was so wonderful after the dull voyage in the liner that she was not going + to allow herself to be depressed without good reason. After all, she could + go on to Detroit tomorrow. It was nice to have something to which she + could look forward. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, is Elsa in the company?” she said. + </p> + <p> + “Sure. And very good too, I hear.” Mrs. Meecher kept abreast of theatrical + gossip. She was an ex-member of the profession herself, having been in the + first production of “Florodora,” though, unlike everybody else, not one of + the original Sextette. “Mr. Faucitt was down to see a rehearsal, and he + said Miss Doland was fine. And he's not easy to please, as you know.” + </p> + <p> + “How is Mr. Faucitt?” + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Meecher, not unwillingly, for she was a woman who enjoyed the + tragedies of life, made her second essay in the direction of lowering + Sally's uplifted mood. + </p> + <p> + “Poor old gentleman, he ain't over and above well. Went to bed early last + night with a headache, and this morning I been to see him and he don't + look well. There's a lot of this Spanish influenza about. It might be + that. Lots o' people have been dying of it, if you believe what you see in + the papers,” said Mrs. Meecher buoyantly. + </p> + <p> + “Good gracious! You don't think...?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, he ain't turned black,” admitted Mrs. Meecher with regret. “They + say they turn black. If you believe what you see in the papers, that is. + Of course, that may come later,” she added with the air of one confident + that all will come right in the future. “The doctor'll be in to see him + pretty soon. He's quite happy. Toto's sitting with him.” + </p> + <p> + Sally's concern increased. Like everyone who had ever spent any length of + time in the house, she had strong views on Toto. This quadruped, who + stained the fame of the entire canine race by posing as a dog, was a small + woolly animal with a persistent and penetrating yap, hard to bear with + equanimity in health and certainly quite outside the range of a sick man. + Her heart bled for Mr. Faucitt. Mrs. Meecher, on the other hand, who held + a faith in her little pet's amiability and power to soothe which seven + years' close association had been unable to shake, seemed to feel that, + with Toto on the spot, all that could be done had been done as far as + pampering the invalid was concerned. + </p> + <p> + “I must go up and see him,” cried Sally. “Poor old dear.” + </p> + <p> + “Sure. You know his room. You can hear Toto talking to him now,” said Mrs. + Meecher complacently. “He wants a cracker, that's what he wants. Toto + likes a cracker after breakfast.” + </p> + <p> + The invalid's eyes, as Sally entered the room, turned wearily to the door. + At the sight of Sally they lit up with an incredulous rapture. Almost any + intervention would have pleased Mr. Faucitt at that moment, for his little + playmate had long outstayed any welcome that might originally have been + his: but that the caller should be his beloved Sally seemed to the old man + something in the nature of a return of the age of miracles. + </p> + <p> + “Sally!” + </p> + <p> + “One moment. Here, Toto!” + </p> + <p> + Toto, struck momentarily dumb by the sight of food, had jumped off the bed + and was standing with his head on one side, peering questioningly at the + cracker. He was a suspicious dog, but he allowed himself to be lured into + the passage, upon which Sally threw the cracker down and slipped in and + shut the door. Toto, after a couple of yaps, which may have been gratitude + or baffled fury, trotted off downstairs, and Mr. Faucitt drew a deep + breath. + </p> + <p> + “Sally, you come, as ever, as an angel of mercy. Our worthy Mrs. Meecher + means well, and I yield to no man in my respect for her innate kindness of + heart: but she errs in supposing that that thrice-damned whelp of hers is + a combination of sick-nurse, soothing medicine, and a week at the seaside. + She insisted on bringing him here. He was yapping then, as he was yapping + when, with womanly resource which I cannot sufficiently praise, you + decoyed him hence. And each yap went through me like hammer-strokes on + sheeted tin. Sally, you stand alone among womankind. You shine like a good + deed in a naughty world. When did you get back?” + </p> + <p> + “I've only just arrived in my hired barouche from the pier.” + </p> + <p> + “And you came to see your old friend without delay? I am grateful and + flattered. Sally, my dear.” + </p> + <p> + “Of course I came to see you. Do you suppose that, when Mrs. Meecher told + me you were sick, I just said 'Is that so?' and went on talking about the + weather? Well, what do you mean by it? Frightening everybody. Poor old + darling, do you feel very bad?” + </p> + <p> + “One thousand individual mice are nibbling the base of my spine, and I am + conscious of a constant need of cooling refreshment. But what of that? + Your presence is a tonic. Tell me, how did our Sally enjoy foreign + travel?” + </p> + <p> + “Our Sally had the time of her life.” + </p> + <p> + “Did you visit England?” + </p> + <p> + “Only passing through.” + </p> + <p> + “How did it look?” asked Mr. Faucitt eagerly. + </p> + <p> + “Moist. Very moist.” + </p> + <p> + “It would,” said Mr. Faucitt indulgently. “I confess that, happy as I have + been in this country, there are times when I miss those wonderful London + days, when a sort of cosy brown mist hangs over the streets and the + pavements ooze with a perspiration of mud and water, and you see through + the haze the yellow glow of the Bodega lamps shining in the distance like + harbour-lights. Not,” said Mr. Faucitt, “that I specify the Bodega to the + exclusion of other and equally worthy hostelries. I have passed just as + pleasant hours in Rule's and Short's. You missed something by not + lingering in England, Sally.” + </p> + <p> + “I know I did—pneumonia.” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Faucitt shook his head reproachfully. + </p> + <p> + “You are prejudiced, my dear. You would have enjoyed London if you had had + the courage to brave its superficial gloom. Where did you spend your + holiday? Paris?” + </p> + <p> + “Part of the time. And the rest of the while I was down by the sea. It was + glorious. I don't think I would ever have come back if I hadn't had to. + But, of course, I wanted to see you all again. And I wanted to be at the + opening of Mr. Foster's play. Mrs. Meecher tells me you went to one of the + rehearsals.” + </p> + <p> + “I attended a dog-fight which I was informed was a rehearsal,” said Mr. + Faucitt severely. “There is no rehearsing nowadays.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh dear! Was it as bad as all that?” + </p> + <p> + “The play is good. The play—I will go further—is excellent. It + has fat. But the acting...” + </p> + <p> + “Mrs. Meecher said you told her that Elsa was good.” + </p> + <p> + “Our worthy hostess did not misreport me. Miss Doland has great + possibilities. She reminds me somewhat of Matilda Devine, under whose + banner I played a season at the Old Royalty in London many years ago. She + has the seeds of greatness in her, but she is wasted in the present case + on an insignificant part. There is only one part in the play. I allude to + the one murdered by Miss Mabel Hobson.” + </p> + <p> + “Murdered!” Sally's heart sank. She had been afraid of this, and it was no + satisfaction to feel that she had warned Gerald. “Is she very terrible?” + </p> + <p> + “She has the face of an angel and the histrionic ability of that curious + suet pudding which our estimable Mrs. Meecher is apt to give us on + Fridays. In my professional career I have seen many cases of what I may + term the Lady Friend in the role of star, but Miss Hobson eclipses them + all. I remember in the year '94 a certain scion of the plutocracy took it + into his head to present a female for whom he had conceived an admiration + in a part which would have taxed the resources of the ablest. I was + engaged in her support, and at the first rehearsal I recollect saying to + my dear old friend, Arthur Moseby—dead, alas, these many years. An + excellent juvenile, but, like so many good fellows, cursed with a tendency + to lift the elbow—I recollect saying to him 'Arthur, dear boy, I + give it two weeks.' 'Max,' was his reply, 'you are an incurable optimist. + One consecutive night, laddie, one consecutive night.' We had, I recall, + an even half-crown upon it. He won. We opened at Wigan, our leading lady + got the bird, and the show closed next day. I was forcibly reminded of + this incident as I watched Miss Hobson rehearsing.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, poor Ger—poor Mr. Foster!” + </p> + <p> + “I do not share your commiseration for that young man,” said Mr. Faucitt + austerely. “You probably are almost a stranger to him, but he and I have + been thrown together a good deal of late. A young man upon whom, mark my + words, success, if it ever comes, will have the worst effects. I dislike + him. Sally. He is, I think, without exception, the most selfish and + self-centred young man of my acquaintance. He reminds me very much of old + Billy Fothergill, with whom I toured a good deal in the later eighties. + Did I ever tell you the story of Billy and the amateur who...?” + </p> + <p> + Sally was in no mood to listen to the adventures of Mr. Fothergill. The + old man's innocent criticism of Gerald had stabbed her deeply. A momentary + impulse to speak hotly in his defence died away as she saw Mr. Faucitt's + pale, worn old face. He had meant no harm, after all. How could he know + what Gerald was to her? + </p> + <p> + She changed the conversation abruptly. + </p> + <p> + “Have you seen anything of Fillmore while I've been away?” + </p> + <p> + “Fillmore? Why yes, my dear, curiously enough I happened to run into him + on Broadway only a few days ago. He seemed changed—less stiff and + aloof than he had been for some time past. I may be wronging him, but + there have been times of late when one might almost have fancied him a + trifle up-stage. All that was gone at our last encounter. He appeared glad + to see me and was most cordial.” + </p> + <p> + Sally found her composure restored. Her lecture on the night of the party + had evidently, she thought, not been wasted. Mr. Faucitt, however, + advanced another theory to account for the change in the Man of Destiny. + </p> + <p> + “I rather fancy,” he said, “that the softening influence has been the + young man's fiancée.” + </p> + <p> + “What? Fillmore's not engaged?” + </p> + <p> + “Did he not write and tell you? I suppose he was waiting to inform you + when you returned. Yes, Fillmore is betrothed. The lady was with him when + we met. A Miss Winch. In the profession, I understand. He introduced me. A + very charming and sensible young lady, I thought.” + </p> + <p> + Sally shook her head. + </p> + <p> + “She can't be. Fillmore would never have got engaged to anyone like that. + Was her hair crimson?” + </p> + <p> + “Brown, if I recollect rightly.” + </p> + <p> + “Very loud, I suppose, and overdressed?” + </p> + <p> + “On the contrary, neat and quiet.” + </p> + <p> + “You've made a mistake,” said Sally decidedly. “She can't have been like + that. I shall have to look into this. It does seem hard that I can't go + away for a few weeks without all my friends taking to beds of sickness and + all my brothers getting ensnared by vampires.” + </p> + <p> + A knock at the door interrupted her complaint. Mrs. Meecher entered, + ushering in a pleasant little man with spectacles and black bag. + </p> + <p> + “The doctor to see you, Mr. Faucitt.” Mrs. Meecher cast an appraising eye + at the invalid, as if to detect symptoms of approaching discoloration. + “I've been telling him that what I think you've gotten is this here new + Spanish influenza. Two more deaths there were in the paper this morning, + if you can believe what you see...” + </p> + <p> + “I wonder,” said the doctor, “if you would mind going and bringing me a + small glass of water?” + </p> + <p> + “Why, sure.” + </p> + <p> + “Not a large glass—a small glass. Just let the tap run for a few + moments and take care not to spill any as you come up the stairs. I always + ask ladies, like our friend who has just gone,” he added as the door + closed, “to bring me a glass of water. It keeps them amused and interested + and gets them out of the way, and they think I am going to do a conjuring + trick with it. As a matter of fact, I'm going to drink it. Now let's have + a look at you.” + </p> + <p> + The examination did not take long. At the end of it the doctor seemed + somewhat chagrined. + </p> + <p> + “Our good friend's diagnosis was correct. I'd give a leg to say it wasn't, + but it was. It is this here new Spanish influenza. Not a bad attack. You + want to stay in bed and keep warm, and I'll write you out a prescription. + You ought to be nursed. Is this young lady a nurse?” + </p> + <p> + “No, no, merely...” + </p> + <p> + “Of course I'm a nurse,” said Sally decidedly. “It isn't difficult, is it, + doctor? I know nurses smooth pillows. I can do that. Is there anything + else?” + </p> + <p> + “Their principal duty is to sit here and prevent the excellent and + garrulous lady who has just left us from getting in. They must also be + able to aim straight with a book or an old shoe, if that small woolly dog + I met downstairs tries to force an entrance. If you are equal to these + tasks, I can leave the case in your hands with every confidence.” + </p> + <p> + “But, Sally, my dear,” said Mr. Faucitt, concerned, “you must not waste + your time looking after me. You have a thousand things to occupy you.” + </p> + <p> + “There's nothing I want to do more than help you to get better. I'll just + go out and send a wire, and then I'll be right back.” + </p> + <p> + Five minutes later, Sally was in a Western Union office, telegraphing to + Gerald that she would be unable to reach Detroit in time for the opening. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0006" id="link2HCH0006"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER VI. FIRST AID FOR FILLMORE + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + It was not till the following Friday that Sally was able to start for + Detroit. She arrived on the Saturday morning and drove to the Hotel + Statler. Having ascertained that Gerald was stopping in the hotel and + having 'phoned up to his room to tell him to join her, she went into the + dining-room and ordered breakfast. + </p> + <p> + She felt low-spirited as she waited for the food to arrive. The nursing of + Mr. Faucitt had left her tired, and she had not slept well on the train. + But the real cause of her depression was the fact that there had been a + lack of enthusiasm in Gerald's greeting over the telephone just now. He + had spoken listlessly, as though the fact of her returning after all these + weeks was a matter of no account, and she felt hurt and perplexed. + </p> + <p> + A cup of coffee had a stimulating effect. Men, of course, were always like + this in the early morning. It would, no doubt, be a very different Gerald + who would presently bound into the dining-room, quickened and restored by + a cold shower-bath. In the meantime, here was food, and she needed it. + </p> + <p> + She was pouring out her second cup of coffee when a stout young man, of + whom she had caught a glimpse as he moved about that section of the hotel + lobby which was visible through the open door of the dining-room, came in + and stood peering about as though in search of someone. The momentary + sight she had had of this young man had interested Sally. She had thought + how extraordinarily like he was to her brother Fillmore. Now she perceived + that it was Fillmore himself. + </p> + <p> + Sally was puzzled. What could Fillmore be doing so far west? She had + supposed him to be a permanent resident of New York. But, of course, your + man of affairs and vast interests flits about all over the place. At any + rate, here he was, and she called him. And, after he had stood in the + doorway looking in every direction except the right one for another + minute, he saw her and came over to her table. + </p> + <p> + “Why, Sally?” His manner, she thought, was nervous—one might almost + have said embarrassed. She attributed this to a guilty conscience. + Presently he would have to break to her the news that he had become + engaged to be married without her sisterly sanction, and no doubt he was + wondering how to begin. “What are you doing here? I thought you were in + Europe.” + </p> + <p> + “I got back a week ago, but I've been nursing poor old Mr. Faucitt ever + since then. He's been ill, poor old dear. I've come here to see Mr. + Foster's play, 'The Primrose Way,' you know. Is it a success?” + </p> + <p> + “It hasn't opened yet.” + </p> + <p> + “Don't be silly, Fill. Do pull yourself together. It opened last Monday.” + </p> + <p> + “No, it didn't. Haven't you heard? They've closed all the theatres because + of this infernal Spanish influenza. Nothing has been playing this week. + You must have seen it in the papers.” + </p> + <p> + “I haven't had time to read the papers. Oh, Fill, what an awful shame!” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, it's pretty tough. Makes the company all on edge. I've had the + darndest time, I can tell you.” + </p> + <p> + “Why, what have you got to do with it?” + </p> + <p> + Fillmore coughed. + </p> + <p> + “I—er—oh, I didn't tell you that. I'm sort of—er—mixed + up in the show. Cracknell—you remember he was at college with me—suggested + that I should come down and look at it. Shouldn't wonder if he wants me to + put money into it and so on.” + </p> + <p> + “I thought he had all the money in the world.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, he has a lot, but these fellows like to let a pal in on a good + thing.” + </p> + <p> + “Is it a good thing?” + </p> + <p> + “The play's fine.” + </p> + <p> + “That's what Mr. Faucitt said. But Mabel Hobson...” + </p> + <p> + Fillmore's ample face registered emotion. + </p> + <p> + “She's an awful woman, Sally! She can't act, and she throws her weight + about all the time. The other day there was a fuss about a paper-knife...” + </p> + <p> + “How do you mean, a fuss about a paper-knife?” + </p> + <p> + “One of the props, you know. It got mislaid. I'm certain it wasn't my + fault...” + </p> + <p> + “How could it have been your fault?” asked Sally wonderingly. Love seemed + to have the worst effects on Fillmore's mentality. + </p> + <p> + “Well—er—you know how it is. Angry woman... blames the first + person she sees... This paper-knife...” + </p> + <p> + Fillmore's voice trailed off into pained silence. + </p> + <p> + “Mr. Faucitt said Elsa Doland was good.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, she's all right,” said Fillmore indifferently. “But—” His face + brightened and animation crept into his voice. “But the girl you want to + watch is Miss Winch. Gladys Winch. She plays the maid. She's only in the + first act, and hasn't much to say, except 'Did you ring, madam?' and + things like that. But it's the way she says 'em! Sally, that girl's a + genius! The greatest character actress in a dozen years! You mark my + words, in a darned little while you'll see her name up on Broadway in + electric light. Personality? Ask me! Charm? She wrote the words and music! + Looks?...” + </p> + <p> + “All right! All right! I know all about it, Fill. And will you kindly + inform me how you dared to get engaged without consulting me?” + </p> + <p> + Fillmore blushed richly. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, do you know?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes. Mr. Faucitt told me.” + </p> + <p> + “Well...” + </p> + <p> + “Well?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, I'm only human,” argued Fillmore. + </p> + <p> + “I call that a very handsome admission. You've got quite modest, Fill.” + </p> + <p> + He had certainly changed for the better since their last meeting. + </p> + <p> + It was as if someone had punctured him and let out all the pomposity. If + this was due, as Mr. Faucitt had suggested, to the influence of Miss + Winch, Sally felt that she could not but approve of the romance. + </p> + <p> + “I'll introduce you sometime,' said Fillmore. + </p> + <p> + “I want to meet her very much.” + </p> + <p> + “I'll have to be going now. I've got to see Bunbury. I thought he might be + in here.” + </p> + <p> + “Who's Bunbury?” + </p> + <p> + “The producer. I suppose he is breakfasting in his room. I'd better go + up.” + </p> + <p> + “You are busy, aren't you. Little marvel! It's lucky they've got you to + look after them.” + </p> + <p> + Fillmore retired and Sally settled down to wait for Gerald, no longer hurt + by his manner over the telephone. Poor Gerald! No wonder he had seemed + upset. + </p> + <p> + A few minutes later he came in. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, Jerry darling,” said Sally, as he reached the table, “I'm so sorry. + I've just been hearing about it.” + </p> + <p> + Gerald sat down. His appearance fulfilled the promise of his voice over + the telephone. A sort of nervous dullness wrapped him about like a + garment. + </p> + <p> + “It's just my luck,” he said gloomily. “It's the kind of thing that + couldn't happen to anyone but me. Damned fools! Where's the sense in + shutting the theatres, even if there is influenza about? They let people + jam against one another all day in the stores. If that doesn't hurt them + why should it hurt them to go to theatres? Besides, it's all infernal + nonsense about this thing. I don't believe there is such a thing as + Spanish influenza. People get colds in their heads and think they're + dying. It's all a fake scare.” + </p> + <p> + “I don't think it's that,” said Sally. “Poor Mr. Faucitt had it quite + badly. That's why I couldn't come earlier.” + </p> + <p> + Gerald did not seem interested either by the news of Mr. Faucitt's illness + or by the fact that Sally, after delay, had at last arrived. He dug a + spoon sombrely into his grape-fruit. + </p> + <p> + “We've been hanging about here day after day, getting bored to death all + the time... The company's going all to pieces. They're sick of rehearsing + and rehearsing when nobody knows if we'll ever open. They were all keyed + up a week ago, and they've been sagging ever since. It will ruin the play, + of course. My first chance! Just chucked away.” + </p> + <p> + Sally was listening with a growing feeling of desolation. She tried to be + fair, to remember that he had had a terrible disappointment and was under + a great strain. And yet... it was unfortunate that self-pity was a thing + she particularly disliked in a man. Her vanity, too, was hurt. It was + obvious that her arrival, so far from acting as a magic restorative, had + effected nothing. She could not help remembering, though it made her feel + disloyal, what Mr. Faucitt had said about Gerald. She had never noticed + before that he was remarkably self-centred, but he was thrusting the fact + upon her attention now. + </p> + <p> + “That Hobson woman is beginning to make trouble,” went on Gerald, prodding + in a despairing sort of way at scrambled eggs. “She ought never to have + had the part, never. She can't handle it. Elsa Doland could play it a + thousand times better. I wrote Elsa in a few lines the other day, and the + Hobson woman went right up in the air. You don't know what a star is till + you've seen one of these promoted clothes-props from the Follies trying to + be one. It took me an hour to talk her round and keep her from throwing up + her part.” + </p> + <p> + “Why not let her throw up her part?” + </p> + <p> + “For heaven's sake talk sense,” said Gerald querulously. “Do you suppose + that man Cracknell would keep the play on if she wasn't in it? He would + close the show in a second, and where would I be then? You don't seem to + realize that this is a big chance for me. I'd look a fool throwing it + away.” + </p> + <p> + “I see,” said Sally, shortly. She had never felt so wretched in her life. + Foreign travel, she decided, was a mistake. It might be pleasant and + broadening to the mind, but it seemed to put you so out of touch with + people when you got back. She analysed her sensations, and arrived at the + conclusion that what she was resenting was the fact that Gerald was trying + to get the advantages of two attitudes simultaneously. A man in trouble + may either be the captain of his soul and superior to pity, or he may be a + broken thing for a woman to pet and comfort. Gerald, it seemed to her, was + advertising himself as an object for her commiseration, and at the same + time raising a barrier against it. He appeared to demand her sympathy + while holding himself aloof from it. She had the uncomfortable sensation + of feeling herself shut out and useless. + </p> + <p> + “By the way,” said Gerald, “there's one thing. I have to keep her jollying + along all the time, so for goodness' sake don't go letting it out that + we're engaged.” + </p> + <p> + Sally's chin went up with a jerk. This was too much. + </p> + <p> + “If you find it a handicap being engaged to me...” + </p> + <p> + “Don't be silly.” Gerald took refuge in pathos. “Good God! It's tough! + Here am I, worried to death, and you...” + </p> + <p> + Before he could finish the sentence, Sally's mood had undergone one of + those swift changes which sometimes made her feel that she must be lacking + in character. A simple, comforting thought had come to her, altering her + entire outlook. She had come off the train tired and gritty, and what + seemed the general out-of-jointness of the world was entirely due, she + decided, to the fact that she had not had a bath and that her hair was all + anyhow. She felt suddenly tranquil. If it was merely her grubby and + dishevelled condition that made Gerald seem to her so different, all was + well. She put her hand on his with a quick gesture of penitence. + </p> + <p> + “I'm so sorry,” she said. “I've been a brute, but I do sympathize, + really.” + </p> + <p> + “I've had an awful time,” mumbled Gerald. + </p> + <p> + “I know, I know. But you never told me you were glad to see me.” + </p> + <p> + “Of course I'm glad to see you.” + </p> + <p> + “Why didn't you say so, then, you poor fish? And why didn't you ask me if + I had enjoyed myself in Europe?” + </p> + <p> + “Did you enjoy yourself?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, except that I missed you so much. There! Now we can consider my + lecture on foreign travel finished, and you can go on telling me your + troubles.” + </p> + <p> + Gerald accepted the invitation. He spoke at considerable length, though + with little variety. It appeared definitely established in his mind that + Providence had invented Spanish influenza purely with a view to wrecking + his future. But now he seemed less aloof, more open to sympathy. The brief + thunderstorm had cleared the air. Sally lost that sense of detachment and + exclusion which had weighed upon her. + </p> + <p> + “Well,” said Gerald, at length, looking at his watch, “I suppose I had + better be off.” + </p> + <p> + “Rehearsal?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, confound it. It's the only way of getting through the day. Are you + coming along?” + </p> + <p> + “I'll come directly I've unpacked and tidied myself up.” + </p> + <p> + “See you at the theatre, then.” + </p> + <p> + Sally went out and rang for the lift to take her up to her room. + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + The rehearsal had started when she reached the theatre. As she entered the + dark auditorium, voices came to her with that thin and reedy effect which + is produced by people talking in an empty building. She sat down at the + back of the house, and, as her eyes grew accustomed to the gloom, was able + to see Gerald sitting in the front row beside a man with a bald head + fringed with orange hair whom she took correctly to be Mr. Bunbury, the + producer. Dotted about the house in ones and twos were members of the + company whose presence was not required in the first act. On the stage, + Elsa Doland, looking very attractive, was playing a scene with a man in a + bowler hat. She was speaking a line, as Sally came in. + </p> + <p> + “Why, what do you mean, father?” + </p> + <p> + “Tiddly-omty-om,” was the bowler-hatted one's surprising reply. + “Tiddly-omty-om... long speech ending in 'find me in the library.' And + exit,” said the man in the bowler hat, starting to do so. + </p> + <p> + For the first time Sally became aware of the atmosphere of nerves. Mr. + Bunbury, who seemed to be a man of temperament, picked up his + walking-stick, which was leaning against the next seat, and flung it with + some violence across the house. + </p> + <p> + “For God's sake!” said Mr. Bunbury. + </p> + <p> + “Now what?” inquired the bowler hat, interested, pausing hallway across + the stage. + </p> + <p> + “Do speak the lines, Teddy,” exclaimed Gerald. “Don't skip them in that + sloppy fashion.” + </p> + <p> + “You don't want me to go over the whole thing?” asked the bowler hat, + amazed. + </p> + <p> + “Yes!” + </p> + <p> + “Not the whole damn thing?” queried the bowler hat, fighting with + incredulity. + </p> + <p> + “This is a rehearsal,” snapped Mr. Bunbury. “If we are not going to do it + properly, what's the use of doing it at all?” + </p> + <p> + This seemed to strike the erring Teddy, if not as reasonable, at any rate + as one way of looking at it. He delivered the speech in an injured tone + and shuffled off. The atmosphere of tenseness was unmistakable now. Sally + could feel it. The world of the theatre is simply a large nursery and its + inhabitants children who readily become fretful if anything goes wrong. + The waiting and the uncertainty, the loafing about in strange hotels in a + strange city, the dreary rehearsing of lines which had been polished to + the last syllable more than a week ago—these things had sapped the + nerve of the Primrose Way company and demoralization had set in. It would + require only a trifle to produce an explosion. + </p> + <p> + Elsa Doland now moved to the door, pressed a bell, and, taking a magazine + from the table, sat down in a chair near the footlights. A moment later, + in answer to the ring, a young woman entered, to be greeted instantly by + an impassioned bellow from Mr. Bunbury. + </p> + <p> + “Miss Winch!” + </p> + <p> + The new arrival stopped and looked out over the footlights, not in the + pained manner of the man in the bowler hat, but with the sort of genial + indulgence of one who has come to a juvenile party to amuse the children. + She was a square, wholesome, good-humoured looking girl with a serious + face, the gravity of which was contradicted by the faint smile that seemed + to lurk about the corner of her mouth. She was certainly not pretty, and + Sally, watching her with keen interest, was surprised that Fillmore had + had the sense to disregard surface homeliness and recognize her charm. + Deep down in Fillmore, Sally decided, there must lurk an unsuspected vein + of intelligence. + </p> + <p> + “Hello?” said Miss Winch, amiably. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Bunbury seemed profoundly moved. + </p> + <p> + “Miss Winch, did I or did I not ask you to refrain from chewing gum during + rehearsal?” + </p> + <p> + “That's right, so you did,” admitted Miss Winch, chummily. + </p> + <p> + “Then why are you doing it?” + </p> + <p> + Fillmore's fiancée revolved the criticized refreshment about her tongue + for a moment before replying. + </p> + <p> + “Bit o' business,” she announced, at length. + </p> + <p> + “What do you mean, a bit of business?” + </p> + <p> + “Character stuff,” explained Miss Winch in her pleasant, drawling voice. + “Thought it out myself. Maids chew gum, you know.” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Bunbury ruffled his orange hair in an over-wrought manner with the + palm of his right hand. + </p> + <p> + “Have you ever seen a maid?” he asked, despairingly. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, sir. And they chew gum.” + </p> + <p> + “I mean a parlour-maid in a smart house,” moaned Mr. Bunbury. “Do you + imagine for a moment that in a house such as this is supposed to be the + parlour-maid would be allowed to come into the drawing-room champing that + disgusting, beastly stuff?” + </p> + <p> + Miss Winch considered the point. + </p> + <p> + “Maybe you're right.” She brightened. “Listen! Great idea! Mr. Foster can + write in a line for Elsa, calling me down, and another giving me a good + come-back, and then another for Elsa saying something else, and then + something really funny for me, and so on. We can work it up into a big + comic scene. Five or six minutes, all laughs.” + </p> + <p> + This ingenious suggestion had the effect of depriving the producer + momentarily of speech, and while he was struggling for utterance, there + dashed out from the wings a gorgeous being in blue velvet and a hat of + such unimpeachable smartness that Sally ached at the sight of it with a + spasm of pure envy. + </p> + <p> + “Say!” + </p> + <p> + Miss Mabel Hobson had practically every personal advantage which nature + can bestow with the exception of a musical voice. Her figure was perfect, + her face beautiful, and her hair a mass of spun gold; but her voice in + moments of emotion was the voice of a peacock. + </p> + <p> + “Say, listen to me for just one moment!” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Bunbury recovered from his trance. + </p> + <p> + “Miss Hobson! Please!” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, that's all very well...” + </p> + <p> + “You are interrupting the rehearsal.” + </p> + <p> + “You bet your sorrowful existence I'm interrupting the rehearsal,” agreed + Miss Hobson, with emphasis. “And, if you want to make a little easy money, + you go and bet somebody ten seeds that I'm going to interrupt it again + every time there's any talk of writing up any darned part in the show + except mine. Write up other people's parts? Not while I have my strength!” + </p> + <p> + A young man with butter-coloured hair, who had entered from the wings in + close attendance on the injured lady, attempted to calm the storm. + </p> + <p> + “Now, sweetie!” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, can it, Reggie!” said Miss Hobson, curtly. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Cracknell obediently canned it. He was not one of your brutal + cave-men. He subsided into the recesses of a high collar and began to chew + the knob of his stick. + </p> + <p> + “I'm the star,” resumed Miss Hobson, vehemently, “and, if you think + anybody else's part's going to be written up... well, pardon me while I + choke with laughter! If so much as a syllable is written into anybody's + part, I walk straight out on my two feet. You won't see me go, I'll be so + quick.” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Bunbury sprang to his feet and waved his hands. + </p> + <p> + “For heaven's sake! Are we rehearsing, or is this a debating society? Miss + Hobson, nothing is going to be written into anybody's part. Now are you + satisfied?” + </p> + <p> + “She said...” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, never mind,” observed Miss Winch, equably. “It was only a random + thought. Working for the good of the show all the time. That's me.” + </p> + <p> + “Now, sweetie!” pleaded Mr. Cracknell, emerging from the collar like a + tortoise. + </p> + <p> + Miss Hobson reluctantly allowed herself to be reassured. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, well, that's all right, then. But don't forget I know how to look + after myself,” she said, stating a fact which was abundantly obvious to + all who had had the privilege of listening to her. “Any raw work, and out + I walk so quick it'll make you giddy.” + </p> + <p> + She retired, followed by Mr. Cracknell, and the wings swallowed her up. + </p> + <p> + “Shall I say my big speech now?” inquired Miss Winch, over the footlights. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, yes! Get on with the rehearsal. We've wasted half the morning.” + </p> + <p> + “Did you ring, madam?” said Miss Winch to Elsa, who had been reading her + magazine placidly through the late scene. + </p> + <p> + The rehearsal proceeded, and Sally watched it with a sinking heart. It was + all wrong. Novice as she was in things theatrical, she could see that. + There was no doubt that Miss Hobson was superbly beautiful and would have + shed lustre on any part which involved the minimum of words and the + maximum of clothes: but in the pivotal role of a serious play, her very + physical attributes only served to emphasize and point her hopeless + incapacity. Sally remembered Mr. Faucitt's story of the lady who got the + bird at Wigan. She did not see how history could fail to repeat itself. + The theatrical public of America will endure much from youth and beauty, + but there is a limit. + </p> + <p> + A shrill, passionate cry from the front row, and Mr. Bunbury was on his + feet again. Sally could not help wondering whether things were going + particularly wrong to-day, or whether this was one of Mr. Bunbury's + ordinary mornings. + </p> + <p> + “Miss Hobson!” + </p> + <p> + The action of the drama had just brought that emotional lady on left + centre and had taken her across to the desk which stood on the other side + of the stage. The desk was an important feature of the play, for it + symbolized the absorption in business which, exhibited by her husband, was + rapidly breaking Miss Hobson's heart. He loved his desk better than his + young wife, that was what it amounted to, and no wife can stand that sort + of thing. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, gee!” said Miss Hobson, ceasing to be the distressed wife and + becoming the offended star. “What's it this time?” + </p> + <p> + “I suggested at the last rehearsal and at the rehearsal before and the + rehearsal before that, that, on that line, you, should pick up the + paper-knife and toy negligently with it. You did it yesterday, and to-day + you've forgotten it again.” + </p> + <p> + “My God!” cried Miss Hobson, wounded to the quick. “If this don't beat + everything! How the heck can I toy negligently with a paper-knife when + there's no paper-knife for me to toy negligently with?” + </p> + <p> + “The paper-knife is on the desk.” + </p> + <p> + “It's not on the desk.” + </p> + <p> + “No paper-knife?” + </p> + <p> + “No paper-knife. And it's no good picking on me. I'm the star, not the + assistant stage manager. If you're going to pick on anybody, pick on him.” + </p> + <p> + The advice appeared to strike Mr. Bunbury as good. He threw back his head + and bayed like a bloodhound. + </p> + <p> + There was a momentary pause, and then from the wings on the prompt side + there shambled out a stout and shrinking figure, in whose hand was a + script of the play and on whose face, lit up by the footlights, there + shone a look of apprehension. It was Fillmore, the Man of Destiny. + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + Alas, poor Fillmore! He stood in the middle of the stage with the + lightning of Mr. Bunbury's wrath playing about his defenceless head, and + Sally, recovering from her first astonishment, sent a wave of sisterly + commiseration floating across the theatre to him. She did not often pity + Fillmore. His was a nature which in the sunshine of prosperity had a + tendency to grow a trifle lush; and such of the minor ills of life as had + afflicted him during the past three years, had, she considered, been + wholesome and educative and a matter not for concern but for + congratulation. Unmoved, she had watched him through that lean period + lunching on coffee and buckwheat cakes, and curbing from motives of + economy a somewhat florid taste in dress. But this was different. This was + tragedy. Somehow or other, blasting disaster must have smitten the + Fillmore bank-roll, and he was back where he had started. His presence + here this morning could mean nothing else. + </p> + <p> + She recalled his words at the breakfast-table about financing the play. + How like Fillmore to try to save his face for the moment with an + outrageous bluff, though well aware that he would have to reveal the truth + sooner or later. She realized how he must have felt when he had seen her + at the hotel. Yes, she was sorry for Fillmore. + </p> + <p> + And, as she listened to the fervent eloquence of Mr. Bunbury, she + perceived that she had every reason to be. Fillmore was having a bad time. + One of the chief articles of faith in the creed of all theatrical + producers is that if anything goes wrong it must be the fault of the + assistant stage manager and Mr. Bunbury was evidently orthodox in his + views. He was showing oratorical gifts of no mean order. The paper-knife + seemed to inspire him. Gradually, Sally began to get the feeling that this + harmless, necessary stage-property was the source from which sprang most, + if not all, of the trouble in the world. It had disappeared before. Now it + had disappeared again. Could Mr. Bunbury go on struggling in a universe + where this sort of thing happened? He seemed to doubt it. Being a + red-blooded, one-hundred-per-cent American man, he would try hard, but it + was a hundred to one shot that he would get through. He had asked for a + paper-knife. There was no paper-knife. Why was there no paper-knife? Where + was the paper-knife anyway? + </p> + <p> + “I assure you, Mr. Bunbury,” bleated the unhappy Fillmore, obsequiously. + “I placed it with the rest of the properties after the last rehearsal.” + </p> + <p> + “You couldn't have done.” + </p> + <p> + “I assure you I did.” + </p> + <p> + “And it walked away, I suppose,” said Miss Hobson with cold scorn, pausing + in the operation of brightening up her lower lip with a lip-stick. + </p> + <p> + A calm, clear voice spoke. + </p> + <p> + “It was taken away,” said the calm, clear voice. + </p> + <p> + Miss Winch had added herself to the symposium. She stood beside Fillmore, + chewing placidly. It took more than raised voices and gesticulating hands + to disturb Miss Winch. + </p> + <p> + “Miss Hobson took it,” she went on in her cosy, drawling voice. “I saw + her.” + </p> + <p> + Sensation in court. The prisoner, who seemed to feel his position deeply, + cast a pop-eyed glance full of gratitude at his advocate. Mr. Bunbury, in + his capacity of prosecuting attorney, ran his fingers through his hair in + some embarrassment, for he was regretting now that he had made such a + fuss. Miss Hobson thus assailed by an underling, spun round and dropped + the lip-stick, which was neatly retrieved by the assiduous Mr. Cracknell. + Mr. Cracknell had his limitations, but he was rather good at picking up + lip-sticks. + </p> + <p> + “What's that? I took it? I never did anything of the sort.” + </p> + <p> + “Miss Hobson took it after the rehearsal yesterday,” drawled Gladys Winch, + addressing the world in general, “and threw it negligently at the theatre + cat.” + </p> + <p> + Miss Hobson seemed taken aback. Her composure was not restored by Mr. + Bunbury's next remark. The producer, like his company, had been feeling + the strain of the past few days, and, though as a rule he avoided anything + in the nature of a clash with the temperamental star, this matter of the + missing paper-knife had bitten so deeply into his soul that he felt + compelled to speak his mind. + </p> + <p> + “In future, Miss Hobson, I should be glad if, when you wish to throw + anything at the cat, you would not select a missile from the property box. + Good heavens!” he cried, stung by the way fate was maltreating him, “I + have never experienced anything like this before. I have been producing + plays all my life, and this is the first time this has happened. I have + produced Nazimova. Nazimova never threw paper-knives at cats.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, I hate cats,” said Miss Hobson, as though that settled it. + </p> + <p> + “I,” murmured Miss Winch, “love little pussy, her fur is so warm, and if I + don't hurt her she'll do me no...” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, my heavens!” shouted Gerald Foster, bounding from his seat and for + the first time taking a share in the debate. “Are we going to spend the + whole day arguing about cats and paper-knives? For goodness' sake, clear + the stage and stop wasting time.” + </p> + <p> + Miss Hobson chose to regard this intervention as an affront. + </p> + <p> + “Don't shout at me, Mr. Foster!” + </p> + <p> + “I wasn't shouting at you.” + </p> + <p> + “If you have anything to say to me, lower your voice.” + </p> + <p> + “He can't,” observed Miss Winch. “He's a tenor.” + </p> + <p> + “Nazimova never...” began Mr. Bunbury. + </p> + <p> + Miss Hobson was not to be diverted from her theme by reminiscences of + Nazimova. She had not finished dealing with Gerald. + </p> + <p> + “In the shows I've been in,” she said, mordantly, “the author wasn't + allowed to go about the place getting fresh with the leading lady. In the + shows I've been in the author sat at the back and spoke when he was spoken + to. In the shows I've been in...” + </p> + <p> + Sally was tingling all over. This reminded her of the dog-fight on the + Roville sands. She wanted to be in it, and only the recognition that it + was a private fight and that she would be intruding kept her silent. The + lure of the fray, however, was too strong for her wholly to resist it. + Almost unconsciously, she had risen from her place and drifted down the + aisle so as to be nearer the white-hot centre of things. She was now + standing in the lighted space by the orchestra-pit, and her presence + attracted the roving attention of Miss Hobson, who, having concluded her + remarks on authors and their legitimate sphere of activity, was looking + about for some other object of attack. + </p> + <p> + “Who the devil,” inquired Miss Hobson, “is that?” + </p> + <p> + Sally found herself an object of universal scrutiny and wished that she + had remained in the obscurity of the back rows. + </p> + <p> + “I am Mr. Nicholas' sister,” was the best method of identification that + she could find. + </p> + <p> + “Who's Mr. Nicholas?” + </p> + <p> + Fillmore timidly admitted that he was Mr. Nicholas. He did it in the + manner of one in the dock pleading guilty to a major charge, and at least + half of those present seemed surprised. To them, till now, Fillmore had + been a nameless thing, answering to the shout of “Hi!” + </p> + <p> + Miss Hobson received the information with a laugh of such exceeding + bitterness that strong men blanched and Mr. Cracknell started so + convulsively that he nearly jerked his collar off its stud. + </p> + <p> + “Now, sweetie!” urged Mr. Cracknell. + </p> + <p> + Miss Hobson said that Mr. Cracknell gave her a pain in the gizzard. She + recommended his fading away, and he did so—into his collar. He + seemed to feel that once well inside his collar he was “home” and safe + from attack. + </p> + <p> + “I'm through!” announced Miss Hobson. It appeared that Sally's presence + had in some mysterious fashion fulfilled the function of the last straw. + “This is the by-Goddest show I was ever in! I can stand for a whole lot, + but when it comes to the assistant stage manager being allowed to fill the + theatre with his sisters and his cousins and his aunts it's time to quit.” + </p> + <p> + “But, sweetie!” pleaded Mr. Cracknell, coming to the surface. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, go and choke yourself!” said Miss Hobson, crisply. And, swinging + round like a blue panther, she strode off. A door banged, and the sound of + it seemed to restore Mr. Cracknell's power of movement. He, too, shot up + stage and disappeared. + </p> + <p> + “Hello, Sally,” said Elsa Doland, looking up from her magazine. The + battle, raging all round her, had failed to disturb her detachment. “When + did you get back?” + </p> + <p> + Sally trotted up the steps which had been propped against the stage to + form a bridge over the orchestra pit. + </p> + <p> + “Hello, Elsa.” + </p> + <p> + The late debaters had split into groups. Mr. Bunbury and Gerald were + pacing up and down the central aisle, talking earnestly. Fillmore had + subsided into a chair. + </p> + <p> + “Do you know Gladys Winch?” asked Elsa. + </p> + <p> + Sally shook hands with the placid lodestar of her brother's affections. + Miss Winch, on closer inspection, proved to have deep grey eyes and + freckles. Sally's liking for her increased. + </p> + <p> + “Thank you for saving Fillmore from the wolves,” she said. “They would + have torn him in pieces but for you.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I don't know,” said Miss Winch. + </p> + <p> + “It was noble.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, well!” + </p> + <p> + “I think,” said Sally, “I'll go and have a talk with Fillmore. He looks as + though he wanted consoling.” + </p> + <p> + She made her way to that picturesque ruin. + </p> + <p> + 4 + </p> + <p> + Fillmore had the air of a man who thought it wasn't loaded. A wild, + startled expression had settled itself upon his face and he was breathing + heavily. + </p> + <p> + “Cheer up!” said Sally. Fillmore jumped like a stricken jelly. “Tell me + all,” said Sally, sitting down beside him. “I leave you a gentleman of + large and independent means, and I come back and find you one of the + wage-slaves again. How did it all happen?” + </p> + <p> + “Sally,” said Fillmore, “I will be frank with you. Can you lend me ten + dollars?” + </p> + <p> + “I don't see how you make that out an answer to my question, but here you + are.” + </p> + <p> + “Thanks.” Fillmore pocketed the bill. “I'll let you have it back next + week. I want to take Miss Winch out to lunch.” + </p> + <p> + “If that's what you want it for, don't look on it as a loan, take it as a + gift with my blessing thrown in.” She looked over her shoulder at Miss + Winch, who, the cares of rehearsal being temporarily suspended, was + practising golf-shots with an umbrella at the other side of the stage. + “However did you have the sense to fall in love with her, Fill?” + </p> + <p> + “Do you like her?” asked Fillmore, brightening. + </p> + <p> + “I love her.” + </p> + <p> + “I knew you would. She's just the right girl for me, isn't she?” + </p> + <p> + “She certainly is.” + </p> + <p> + “So sympathetic.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes.” + </p> + <p> + “So kind.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes.” + </p> + <p> + “And she's got brains enough for two, which is the exact quantity the girl + who marries you will need.” + </p> + <p> + Fillmore drew himself up with as much hauteur as a stout man sitting in a + low chair can achieve. + </p> + <p> + “Some day I will make you believe in me, Sally.” + </p> + <p> + “Less of the Merchant Prince, my lad,” said Sally, firmly. “You just + confine yourself to explaining how you got this way, instead of taking up + my valuable time telling me what you mean to do in the future. You've lost + all your money?” + </p> + <p> + “I have suffered certain reverses,” said Fillmore, with dignity, “which + have left me temporarily... Yes, every bean,” he concluded simply. + </p> + <p> + “How?” + </p> + <p> + “Well...” Fillmore hesitated. “I've had bad luck, you know. First I bought + Consolidated Rails for the rise, and they fell. So that went wrong.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes?” + </p> + <p> + “And then I bought Russian Roubles for the fall, and they rose. So that + went wrong.” + </p> + <p> + “Good gracious! Why, I've heard all this before.” + </p> + <p> + “Who told you?” + </p> + <p> + “No, I remember now. It's just that you remind me of a man I met at + Roville. He was telling me the story of his life, and how he had made a + hash of everything. Well, that took all you had, I suppose?” + </p> + <p> + “Not quite. I had a few thousand left, and I went into a deal that really + did look cast-iron.” + </p> + <p> + “And that went wrong!” + </p> + <p> + “It wasn't my fault,” said Fillmore querulously. “It was just my poisonous + luck. A man I knew got me to join a syndicate which had bought up a lot of + whisky. The idea was to ship it into Chicago in herring-barrels. We should + have cleaned up big, only a mutt of a detective took it into his darned + head to go fooling about with a crowbar. Officious ass! It wasn't as if + the barrels weren't labelled 'Herrings' as plainly as they could be,” said + Fillmore with honest indignation. He shuddered. “I nearly got arrested.” + </p> + <p> + “But that went wrong? Well, that's something to be thankful for. Stripes + wouldn't suit your figure.” Sally gave his arm a squeeze. She was very + fond of Fillmore, though for the good of his soul she generally concealed + her affection beneath a manner which he had once compared, not without + some reason, to that of a governess who had afflicted their mutual + childhood. “Never mind, you poor ill-used martyr. Things are sure to come + right. We shall see you a millionaire some day. And, oh heavens, brother + Fillmore, what a bore you'll be when you are! I can just see you being + interviewed and giving hints to young men on how to make good. 'Mr. + Nicholas attributes his success to sheer hard work. He can lay his hand on + his bulging waistcoat and say that he has never once indulged in those + rash get-rich-quick speculations, where you buy for the rise and watch + things fall and then rush out and buy for the fall and watch 'em rise.' + Fill... I'll tell you what I'll do. They all say it's the first bit of + money that counts in building a vast fortune. I'll lend you some of mine.” + </p> + <p> + “You will? Sally, I always said you were an ace.” + </p> + <p> + “I never heard you. You oughtn't to mumble so.” + </p> + <p> + “Will you lend me twenty thousand dollars?” + </p> + <p> + Sally patted his hand soothingly. + </p> + <p> + “Come slowly down to earth,” she said. “Two hundred was the sum I had in + mind.” + </p> + <p> + “I want twenty thousand.” + </p> + <p> + “You'd better rob a bank. Any policeman will direct you to a good bank.” + </p> + <p> + “I'll tell you why I want twenty thousand.” + </p> + <p> + “You might just mention it.” + </p> + <p> + “If I had twenty thousand, I'd buy this production from Cracknell. He'll + be back in a few minutes to tell us that the Hobson woman has quit: and, + if she really has, you take it from me that he will close the show. And, + even if he manages to jolly her along this time and she comes back, it's + going to happen sooner or later. It's a shame to let a show like this + close. I believe in it, Sally. It's a darn good play. With Elsa Doland in + the big part, it couldn't fail.” + </p> + <p> + Sally started. Her money was too recent for her to have grown fully + accustomed to it, and she had never realized that she was in a position to + wave a wand and make things happen on any big scale. The financing of a + theatrical production had always been to her something mysterious and out + of the reach of ordinary persons like herself. Fillmore, that spacious + thinker, had brought it into the sphere of the possible. + </p> + <p> + “He'd sell for less than that, of course, but one would need a bit in + hand. You have to face a loss on the road before coming into New York. I'd + give you ten per cent on your money, Sally.” + </p> + <p> + Sally found herself wavering. The prudent side of her nature, which + hitherto had steered her safely through most of life's rapids, seemed + oddly dormant. Sub-consciously she was aware that on past performances + Fillmore was decidedly not the man to be allowed control of anybody's + little fortune, but somehow the thought did not seem to grip her. He had + touched her imagination. + </p> + <p> + “It's a gold-mine!” + </p> + <p> + Sally's prudent side stirred in its sleep. Fillmore had chosen an + unfortunate expression. To the novice in finance the word gold-mine had + repellent associations. If there was one thing in which Sally had proposed + not to invest her legacy, it was a gold-mine; what she had had in view, as + a matter of fact, had been one of those little fancy shops which are + called Ye Blue Bird or Ye Corner Shoppe, or something like that, where you + sell exotic bric-a-brac to the wealthy at extortionate prices. She knew + two girls who were doing splendidly in that line. As Fillmore spoke those + words, Ye Corner Shoppe suddenly looked very good to her. + </p> + <p> + At this moment, however, two things happened. Gerald and Mr. Bunbury, in + the course of their perambulations, came into the glow of the footlights, + and she was able to see Gerald's face: and at the same time Mr. Reginald + Cracknell hurried on to the stage, his whole demeanour that of the bearer + of evil tidings. + </p> + <p> + The sight of Gerald's face annihilated Sally's prudence at a single + stroke. Ye Corner Shoppe, which a moment before had been shining brightly + before her mental eye, flickered and melted out. The whole issue became + clear and simple. Gerald was miserable and she had it in her power to make + him happy. He was sullenly awaiting disaster and she with a word could + avert it. She wondered that she had ever hesitated. + </p> + <p> + “All right,” she said simply. + </p> + <p> + Fillmore quivered from head to foot. A powerful electric shock could not + have produced a stronger convulsion. He knew Sally of old as cautious and + clear-headed, by no means to be stampeded by a brother's eloquence; and he + had never looked on this thing as anything better than a hundred to one + shot. + </p> + <p> + “You'll do it?” he whispered, and held his breath. After all he might not + have heard correctly. + </p> + <p> + “Yes.” + </p> + <p> + All the complex emotion in Fillmore's soul found expression in one vast + whoop. It rang through the empty theatre like the last trump, beating + against the back wall and rising in hollow echoes to the very gallery. Mr. + Bunbury, conversing in low undertones with Mr. Cracknell across the + footlights, shied like a startled mule. There was reproach and menace in + the look he cast at Fillmore, and a minute earlier it would have reduced + that financial magnate to apologetic pulp. But Fillmore was not to be + intimidated now by a look. He strode down to the group at the footlights, + </p> + <p> + “Cracknell,” he said importantly, “one moment, I should like a word with + you.” + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0007" id="link2HCH0007"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER VII. SOME MEDITATIONS ON SUCCESS + </h2> + <p> + If actors and actresses are like children in that they are readily + depressed by disaster, they have the child's compensating gift of being + easily uplifted by good fortune. It amazed Sally that any one mortal + should have been able to spread such universal happiness as she had done + by the simple act of lending her brother Fillmore twenty thousand dollars. + If the Millennium had arrived, the members of the Primrose Way Company + could not have been on better terms with themselves. The lethargy and + dispiritedness, caused by their week of inaction, fell from them like a + cloak. The sudden elevation of that creature of the abyss, the assistant + stage manager, to the dizzy height of proprietor of the show appealed to + their sense of drama. Most of them had played in pieces where much the + same thing had happened to the persecuted heroine round about eleven + o'clock, and the situation struck them as theatrically sound. Also, now + that she had gone, the extent to which Miss Hobson had acted as a blight + was universally recognized. + </p> + <p> + A spirit of optimism reigned, and cheerful rumours became current. The + bowler-hatted Teddy had it straight from the lift-boy at his hotel that + the ban on the theatres was to be lifted on Tuesday at the latest; while + no less an authority than the cigar-stand girl at the Pontchatrain had + informed the man who played the butler that Toledo and Cleveland were + opening to-morrow. It was generally felt that the sun was bursting through + the clouds and that Fate would soon despair of the hopeless task of trying + to keep good men down. + </p> + <p> + Fillmore was himself again. We all have our particular mode of + self-expression in moments of elation. Fillmore's took the shape of buying + a new waistcoat and a hundred half-dollar cigars and being very fussy + about what he had for lunch. It may have been an optical illusion, but he + appeared to Sally to put on at least six pounds in weight on the first day + of the new regime. As a serf looking after paper-knives and other + properties, he had been—for him—almost slim. As a manager he + blossomed out into soft billowy curves, and when he stood on the sidewalk + in front of the theatre, gloating over the new posters which bore the + legend, + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + FILLMORE NICHOLAS + + PRESENTS +</pre> + <p> + the populace had to make a detour to get round him. + </p> + <p> + In this era of bubbling joy, it was hard that Sally, the fairy godmother + responsible for it all, should not have been completely happy too; and it + puzzled her why she was not. But whatever it was that cast the faint + shadow refused obstinately to come out from the back of her mind and show + itself and be challenged. It was not till she was out driving in a hired + car with Gerald one afternoon on Belle Isle that enlightenment came. + </p> + <p> + Gerald, since the departure of Miss Hobson, had been at his best. Like + Fillmore, he was a man who responded to the sunshine of prosperity. His + moodiness had vanished, and all his old charm had returned. And yet... it + seemed to Sally, as the car slid smoothly through the pleasant woods and + fields by the river, that there was something that jarred. + </p> + <p> + Gerald was cheerful and talkative. He, at any rate, found nothing wrong + with life. He held forth spaciously on the big things he intended to do. + </p> + <p> + “If this play get over—and it's going to—I'll show 'em!” His + jaw was squared, and his eyes glowed as they stared into the inviting + future. “One success—that's all I need—then watch me! I + haven't had a chance yet, but...” + </p> + <p> + His voice rolled on, but Sally had ceased to listen. It was the time of + year when the chill of evening follows swiftly on the mellow warmth of + afternoon. The sun had gone behind the trees, and a cold wind was blowing + up from the river. And quite suddenly, as though it was the wind that had + cleared her mind, she understood what it was that had been lurking at the + back of her thoughts. For an instant it stood out nakedly without + concealment, and the world became a forlorn place. She had realized the + fundamental difference between man's outlook on life and woman's. + </p> + <p> + Success! How men worshipped it, and how little of themselves they had to + spare for anything else. Ironically, it was the theme of this very play of + Gerald's which she had saved from destruction. Of all the men she knew, + how many had any view of life except as a race which they must strain + every nerve to win, regardless of what they missed by the wayside in their + haste? Fillmore—Gerald—all of them. There might be a woman in + each of their lives, but she came second—an afterthought—a + thing for their spare time. Gerald was everything to her. His success + would never be more than a side-issue as far as she was concerned. He + himself, without any of the trappings of success, was enough for her. But + she was not enough for him. A spasm of futile jealousy shook her. She + shivered. + </p> + <p> + “Cold?” said Gerald. “I'll tell the man to drive back... I don't see any + reason why this play shouldn't run a year in New York. Everybody says it's + good... if it does get over, they'll all be after me. I...” + </p> + <p> + Sally stared out into a bleak world. The sky was a leaden grey, and the + wind from the river blew with a dismal chill. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0008" id="link2HCH0008"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER VIII. REAPPEARANCE OF MR. CARMYLE—AND GINGER + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + When Sally left Detroit on the following Saturday, accompanied by + Fillmore, who was returning to the metropolis for a few days in order to + secure offices and generally make his presence felt along Broadway, her + spirits had completely recovered. She felt guiltily that she had been + fanciful, even morbid. Naturally men wanted to get on in the world. It was + their job. She told herself that she was bound up with Gerald's success, + and that the last thing of which she ought to complain was the energy he + put into efforts of which she as well as he would reap the reward. + </p> + <p> + To this happier frame of mind the excitement of the last few days had + contributed. Detroit, that city of amiable audiences, had liked “The + Primrose Way.” The theatre, in fulfilment of Teddy's prophecy, had been + allowed to open on the Tuesday, and a full house, hungry for entertainment + after its enforced abstinence, had welcomed the play wholeheartedly. The + papers, not always in agreement with the applause of a first-night + audience, had on this occasion endorsed the verdict, with agreeable + unanimity hailing Gerald as the coming author and Elsa Doland as the + coming star. There had even been a brief mention of Fillmore as the coming + manager. But there is always some trifle that jars in our greatest + moments, and Fillmore's triumph had been almost spoilt by the fact that + the only notice taken of Gladys Winch was by the critic who printed her + name—spelt Wunch—in the list of those whom the cast “also + included.” + </p> + <p> + “One of the greatest character actresses on the stage,” said Fillmore + bitterly, talking over this outrage with Sally on the morning after the + production. + </p> + <p> + From this blow, however, his buoyant nature had soon enabled him to rally. + Life contained so much that was bright that it would have been churlish to + concentrate the attention on the one dark spot. Business had been + excellent all through the week. Elsa Doland had got better at every + performance. The receipt of a long and agitated telegram from Mr. + Cracknell, pleading to be allowed to buy the piece back, the passage of + time having apparently softened Miss Hobson, was a pleasant incident. And, + best of all, the great Ike Schumann, who owned half the theatres in New + York and had been in Detroit superintending one of his musical + productions, had looked in one evening and stamped “The Primrose Way” with + the seal of his approval. As Fillmore sat opposite Sally on the train, he + radiated contentment and importance. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, do,” said Sally, breaking a long silence. + </p> + <p> + Fillmore awoke from happy dreams. + </p> + <p> + “Eh?” + </p> + <p> + “I said 'Yes, do.' I think you owe it to your position.” + </p> + <p> + “Do what?” + </p> + <p> + “Buy a fur coat. Wasn't that what you were meditating about?” + </p> + <p> + “Don't be a chump,” said Fillmore, blushing nevertheless. It was true that + once or twice during the past week he had toyed negligently, as Mr. + Bunbury would have said, with the notion, and why not? A fellow must keep + warm. + </p> + <p> + “With an astrakhan collar,” insisted Sally. + </p> + <p> + “As a matter of fact,” said Fillmore loftily, his great soul ill-attuned + to this badinage, “what I was really thinking about at the moment was + something Ike said.” + </p> + <p> + “Ike?” + </p> + <p> + “Ike Schumann. He's on the train. I met him just now.” + </p> + <p> + “We call him Ike!” + </p> + <p> + “Of course I call him Ike,” said Fillmore heatedly. “Everyone calls him + Ike.” + </p> + <p> + “He wears a fur coat,” Sally murmured. + </p> + <p> + Fillmore registered annoyance. + </p> + <p> + “I wish you wouldn't keep on harping on that damned coat. And, anyway, why + shouldn't I have a fur coat?” + </p> + <p> + “Fill...! How can you be so brutal as to suggest that I ever said you + shouldn't? Why, I'm one of the strongest supporters of the fur coat. With + big cuffs. And you must roll up Fifth Avenue in your car, and I'll point + and say 'That's my brother!' 'Your brother? No!' 'He is, really.' 'You're + joking. Why, that's the great Fillmore Nicholas.' 'I know. But he really + is my brother. And I was with him when he bought that coat.'” + </p> + <p> + “Do leave off about the coat!” + </p> + <p> + “'And it isn't only the coat,' I shall say. 'It's what's underneath. + Tucked away inside that mass of fur, dodging about behind that dollar + cigar, is one to whom we point with pride... '” + </p> + <p> + Fillmore looked coldly at his watch. + </p> + <p> + “I've got to go and see Ike Schumann.” + </p> + <p> + “We are in hourly consultation with Ike.” + </p> + <p> + “He wants to see me about the show. He suggests putting it into Chicago + before opening in New York.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh no,” cried Sally, dismayed. + </p> + <p> + “Why not?” + </p> + <p> + Sally recovered herself. Identifying Gerald so closely with his play, she + had supposed for a moment that if the piece opened in Chicago it would + mean a further prolonged separation from him. But of course there would be + no need, she realized, for him to stay with the company after the first + day or two. + </p> + <p> + “You're thinking that we ought to have a New York reputation before + tackling Chicago. There's a lot to be said for that. Still, it works both + ways. A Chicago run would help us in New York. Well, I'll have to think it + over,” said Fillmore, importantly, “I'll have to think it over.” + </p> + <p> + He mused with drawn brows. + </p> + <p> + “All wrong,” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + “Eh?” + </p> + <p> + “Not a bit like it. The lips should be compressed and the forefinger of + the right hand laid in a careworn way against the right temple. You've a + lot to learn. Fill.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, stop it!” + </p> + <p> + “Fillmore Nicholas,” said Sally, “if you knew what pain it gives me to + josh my only brother, you'd be sorry for me. But you know it's for your + good. Now run along and put Ike out of his misery. I know he's waiting for + you with his watch out. 'You do think he'll come, Miss Nicholas?' were his + last words to me as he stepped on the train, and oh, Fill, the yearning in + his voice. 'Why, of course he will, Mr. Schumann,' I said. 'For all his + exalted position, my brother is kindliness itself. Of course he'll come.' + 'If I could only think so!' he said with a gulp. 'If I could only think + so. But you know what these managers are. A thousand calls on their time. + They get brooding on their fur coats and forget everything else.' 'Have no + fear, Mr. Schumann,' I said. 'Fillmore Nicholas is a man of his word.'” + </p> + <p> + She would have been willing, for she was a girl who never believed in + sparing herself where it was a question of entertaining her nearest and + dearest, to continue the dialogue, but Fillmore was already moving down + the car, his rigid back a silent protest against sisterly levity. Sally + watched him disappear, then picked up a magazine and began to read. + </p> + <p> + She had just finished tracking a story of gripping interest through a + jungle of advertisements, only to find that it was in two parts, of which + the one she was reading was the first, when a voice spoke. + </p> + <p> + “How do you do, Miss Nicholas?” + </p> + <p> + Into the seat before her, recently released from the weight of the coming + manager, Bruce Carmyle of all people in the world insinuated himself with + that well-bred air of deferential restraint which never left him. + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + Sally was considerably startled. Everybody travels nowadays, of course, + and there is nothing really remarkable in finding a man in America whom + you had supposed to be in Europe: but nevertheless she was conscious of a + dream-like sensation, as though the clock had been turned back and a + chapter of her life reopened which she had thought closed for ever. + </p> + <p> + “Mr. Carmyle!” she cried. + </p> + <p> + If Sally had been constantly in Bruce Carmyle's thoughts since they had + parted on the Paris express, Mr. Carmyle had been very little in Sally's—so + little, indeed, that she had had to search her memory for a moment before + she identified him. + </p> + <p> + “We're always meeting on trains, aren't we?” she went on, her composure + returning. “I never expected to see you in America.” + </p> + <p> + “I came over.” + </p> + <p> + Sally was tempted to reply that she gathered that, but a sudden + embarrassment curbed her tongue. She had just remembered that at their + last meeting she had been abominably rude to this man. She was never rude + to anyone, without subsequent remorse. She contented herself with a tame + “Yes.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes,” said Mr. Carmyle, “it is a good many years since I have taken a + real holiday. My doctor seemed to think I was a trifle run down. It seemed + a good opportunity to visit America. Everybody,” said Mr. Carmyle + oracularly, endeavouring, as he had often done since his ship had left + England, to persuade himself that his object in making the trip had not + been merely to renew his acquaintance with Sally, “everybody ought to + visit America at least once. It is part of one's education.” + </p> + <p> + “And what are your impressions of our glorious country?” said Sally + rallying. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Carmyle seemed glad of the opportunity of lecturing on an impersonal + subject. He, too, though his face had shown no trace of it, had been + embarrassed in the opening stages of the conversation. The sound of his + voice restored him. + </p> + <p> + “I have been visiting Chicago,” he said after a brief travelogue. + </p> + <p> + “Oh!” + </p> + <p> + “A wonderful city.” + </p> + <p> + “I've never seen it. I've come from Detroit.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, I heard you were in Detroit.” + </p> + <p> + Sally's eyes opened. + </p> + <p> + “You heard I was in Detroit? Good gracious! How?” + </p> + <p> + “I—ah—called at your New York address and made inquiries,” + said Mr. Carmyle a little awkwardly. + </p> + <p> + “But how did you know where I lived?” + </p> + <p> + “My cousin—er—Lancelot told me.” + </p> + <p> + Sally was silent for a moment. She had much the same feeling that comes to + the man in the detective story who realizes that he is being shadowed. + Even if this almost complete stranger had not actually come to America in + direct pursuit of her, there was no disguising the fact that he evidently + found her an object of considerable interest. It was a compliment, but + Sally was not at all sure that she liked it. Bruce Carmyle meant nothing + to her, and it was rather disturbing to find that she was apparently of + great importance to him. She seized on the mention of Ginger as a lever + for diverting the conversation from its present too intimate course. + </p> + <p> + “How is Mr. Kemp?” she asked. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Carmyle's dark face seemed to become a trifle darker. + </p> + <p> + “We have had no news of him,” he said shortly. + </p> + <p> + “No news? How do you mean? You speak as though he had disappeared.” + </p> + <p> + “He has disappeared!” + </p> + <p> + “Good heavens! When?” + </p> + <p> + “Shortly after I saw you last.” + </p> + <p> + “Disappeared!” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Carmyle frowned. Sally, watching him, found her antipathy stirring + again. There was something about this man which she had disliked + instinctively from the first, a sort of hardness. + </p> + <p> + “But where has he gone to?” + </p> + <p> + “I don't know.” Mr. Carmyle frowned again. The subject of Ginger was + plainly a sore one. “And I don't want to know,” he went on heatedly, a + dull flush rising in the cheeks which Sally was sure he had to shave twice + a day. “I don't care to know. The Family have washed their hands of him. + For the future he may look after himself as best he can. I believe he is + off his head.” + </p> + <p> + Sally's rebellious temper was well ablaze now, but she fought it down. She + would dearly have loved to give battle to Mr. Carmyle—it was odd, + she felt, how she seemed to have constituted herself Ginger's champion and + protector—but she perceived that, if she wished, as she did, to hear + more of her red-headed friend, he must be humoured and conciliated. + </p> + <p> + “But what happened? What was all the trouble about?” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Carmyle's eyebrows met. + </p> + <p> + “He—insulted his uncle. His uncle Donald. He insulted him—grossly. + The one man in the world he should have made a point of—er—” + </p> + <p> + “Keeping in with?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes. His future depended upon him.” + </p> + <p> + “But what did he do?” cried Sally, trying hard to keep a thoroughly + reprehensible joy out of her voice. + </p> + <p> + “I have heard no details. My uncle is reticent as to what actually took + place. He invited Lancelot to dinner to discuss his plans, and it appears + that Lancelot—defied him. Defied him! He was rude and insulting. My + uncle refuses to have anything more to do with him. Apparently the young + fool managed to win some money at the tables at Roville, and this seems to + have turned his head completely. My uncle insists that he is mad. I agree + with him. Since the night of that dinner nothing has been heard of + Lancelot.” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Carmyle broke off to brood once more, and before Sally could speak the + impressive bulk of Fillmore loomed up in the aisle beside them. + Explanations seemed to Fillmore to be in order. He cast a questioning + glance at the mysterious stranger, who, in addition to being in + conversation with his sister, had collared his seat. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, hullo, Fill,” said Sally. “Fillmore, this is Mr. Carmyle. We met + abroad. My brother Fillmore, Mr. Carmyle.” + </p> + <p> + Proper introduction having been thus effected, Fillmore approved of Mr. + Carmyle. His air of being someone in particular appealed to him. + </p> + <p> + “Strange you meeting again like this,” he said affably. + </p> + <p> + The porter, who had been making up berths along the car, was now hovering + expectantly in the offing. + </p> + <p> + “You two had better go into the smoking room,” suggested Sally. “I'm going + to bed.” + </p> + <p> + She wanted to be alone, to think. Mr. Carmyle's tale of a roused and + revolting Ginger had stirred her. + </p> + <p> + The two men went off to the smoking-room, and Sally found an empty seat + and sat down to wait for her berth to be made up. She was aglow with a + curious exhilaration. So Ginger had taken her advice! Excellent Ginger! + She felt proud of him. She also had that feeling of complacency, amounting + almost to sinful pride, which comes to those who give advice and find it + acted upon. She had the emotions of a creator. After all, had she not + created this new Ginger? It was she who had stirred him up. It was she who + had unleashed him. She had changed him from a meek dependent of the Family + to a ravening creature, who went about the place insulting uncles. + </p> + <p> + It was a feat, there was no denying it. It was something attempted, + something done: and by all the rules laid down by the poet it should, + therefore, have earned a night's repose. Yet, Sally, jolted by the train, + which towards the small hours seemed to be trying out some new + buck-and-wing steps of its own invention, slept ill, and presently, as she + lay awake, there came to her bedside the Spectre of Doubt, gaunt and + questioning. Had she, after all, wrought so well? Had she been wise in + tampering with this young man's life? + </p> + <p> + “What about it?” said the Spectre of Doubt. + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + Daylight brought no comforting answer to the question. Breakfast failed to + manufacture an easy mind. Sally got off the train, at the Grand Central + station in a state of remorseful concern. She declined the offer of Mr. + Carmyle to drive her to the boarding-house, and started to walk there, + hoping that the crisp morning air would effect a cure. + </p> + <p> + She wondered now how she could ever have looked with approval on her rash + act. She wondered what demon of interference and meddling had possessed + her, to make her blunder into people's lives, upsetting them. She wondered + that she was allowed to go around loose. She was nothing more nor less + than a menace to society. Here was an estimable young man, obviously the + sort of young man who would always have to be assisted through life by his + relatives, and she had deliberately egged him on to wreck his prospects. + She blushed hotly as she remembered that mad wireless she had sent him + from the boat. + </p> + <p> + Miserable Ginger! She pictured him, his little stock of money gone, + wandering foot-sore about London, seeking in vain for work; forcing + himself to call on Uncle Donald; being thrown down the front steps by + haughty footmen; sleeping on the Embankment; gazing into the dark waters + of the Thames with the stare of hopelessness; climbing to the parapet + and... + </p> + <p> + “Ugh!” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + She had arrived at the door of the boarding-house, and Mrs. Meecher was + regarding her with welcoming eyes, little knowing that to all practical + intents and purposes she had slain in his prime a red-headed young man of + amiable manners and—when not ill-advised by meddling, muddling + females—of excellent behaviour. + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Meecher was friendly and garrulous. Variety, the journal which, next + to the dog Toto, was the thing she loved best in the world, had informed + her on the Friday morning that Mr. Foster's play had got over big in + Detroit, and that Miss Doland had made every kind of hit. It was not often + that the old alumni of the boarding-house forced their way after this + fashion into the Hall of Fame, and, according to Mrs. Meecher, the + establishment was ringing with the news. That blue ribbon round Toto's + neck was worn in honour of the triumph. There was also, though you could + not see it, a chicken dinner in Toto's interior, by way of further + celebration. + </p> + <p> + And was it true that Mr. Fillmore had bought the piece? A great man, was + Mrs. Meecher's verdict. Mr. Faucitt had always said so... + </p> + <p> + “Oh, how is Mr. Faucitt?” Sally asked, reproaching herself for having + allowed the pressure of other matters to drive all thoughts of her late + patient from her mind. + </p> + <p> + “He's gone,” said Mrs. Meecher with such relish that to Sally, in her + morbid condition, the words had only one meaning. She turned white and + clutched at the banisters. + </p> + <p> + “Gone!” + </p> + <p> + “To England,” added Mrs. Meecher. Sally was vastly relieved. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I thought you meant...” + </p> + <p> + “Oh no, not that.” Mrs. Meecher sighed, for she had been a little + disappointed in the old gentleman, who started out as such a promising + invalid, only to fall away into the dullness of robust health once more. + “He's well enough. I never seen anybody better. You'd think,” said Mrs. + Meecher, bearing up with difficulty under her grievance, “you'd think this + here new Spanish influenza was a sort of a tonic or somep'n, the way he + looks now. Of course,” she added, trying to find justification for a + respected lodger, “he's had good news. His brother's dead.” + </p> + <p> + “What!” + </p> + <p> + “Not, I don't mean, that that was good news, far from it, though, come to + think of it, all flesh is as grass and we all got to be prepared for + somep'n of the sort breaking loose...but it seems this here new brother of + his—I didn't know he'd a brother, and I don't suppose you knew he + had a brother. Men are secretive, ain't they!—this brother of his + has left him a parcel of money, and Mr. Faucitt he had to get on the + Wednesday boat quick as he could and go right over to the other side to + look after things. Wind up the estate, I believe they call it. Left in a + awful hurry, he did. Sent his love to you and said he'd write. Funny him + having a brother, now, wasn't it? Not,” said Mrs. Meecher, at heart a + reasonable woman, “that folks don't have brothers. I got two myself, one + in Portland, Oregon, and the other goodness knows where he is. But what + I'm trying to say...” + </p> + <p> + Sally disengaged herself, and went up to her room. For a brief while the + excitement which comes of hearing good news about those of whom we are + fond acted as a stimulant, and she felt almost cheerful. Dear old Mr. + Faucitt. She was sorry for his brother, of course, though she had never + had the pleasure of his acquaintance and had only just heard that he had + ever existed; but it was nice to think that her old friend's remaining + years would be years of affluence. + </p> + <p> + Presently, however, she found her thoughts wandering back into their + melancholy groove. She threw herself wearily on the bed. She was tired + after her bad night. + </p> + <p> + But she could not sleep. Remorse kept her awake. Besides, she could hear + Mrs. Meecher prowling disturbingly about the house, apparently in search + of someone, her progress indicated by creaking boards and the strenuous + yapping of Toto. + </p> + <p> + Sally turned restlessly, and, having turned remained for a long instant + transfixed and rigid. She had seen something, and what she had seen was + enough to surprise any girl in the privacy of her bedroom. From underneath + the bed there peeped coyly forth an undeniably masculine shoe and six + inches of a grey trouser-leg. + </p> + <p> + Sally bounded to the floor. She was a girl of courage, and she meant to + probe this matter thoroughly. + </p> + <p> + “What are you doing under my bed?” + </p> + <p> + The question was a reasonable one, and evidently seemed to the intruder to + deserve an answer. There was a muffled sneeze, and he began to crawl out. + </p> + <p> + The shoe came first. Then the legs. Then a sturdy body in a dusty coat. + And finally there flashed on Sally's fascinated gaze a head of so nearly + the maximum redness that it could only belong to one person in the world. + </p> + <p> + “Ginger!” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Lancelot Kemp, on all fours, blinked up at her. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, hullo!” he said. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0009" id="link2HCH0009"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER IX. GINGER BECOMES A RIGHT-HAND MAN + </h2> + <p> + It was not till she saw him actually standing there before her with his + hair rumpled and a large smut on the tip of his nose, that Sally really + understood how profoundly troubled she had been about this young man, and + how vivid had been that vision of him bobbing about on the waters of the + Thames, a cold and unappreciated corpse. She was a girl of keen + imagination, and she had allowed her imagination to riot unchecked. + Astonishment, therefore, at the extraordinary fact of his being there was + for the moment thrust aside by relief. Never before in her life had she + experienced such an overwhelming rush of exhilaration. She flung herself + into a chair and burst into a screech of laughter which even to her own + ears sounded strange. It struck Ginger as hysterical. + </p> + <p> + “I say, you know!” said Ginger, as the merriment showed no signs of + abating. Ginger was concerned. Nasty shock for a girl, finding blighters + under her bed. + </p> + <p> + Sally sat up, gurgling, and wiped her eyes. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I am glad to see you,” she gasped. + </p> + <p> + “No, really?” said Ginger, gratified. “That's fine.” It occurred to him + that some sort of apology would be a graceful act. “I say, you know, + awfully sorry. About barging in here, I mean. Never dreamed it was your + room. Unoccupied, I thought.” + </p> + <p> + “Don't mention it. I ought not to have disturbed you. You were having a + nice sleep, of course. Do you always sleep on the floor?” + </p> + <p> + “It was like this...” + </p> + <p> + “Of course, if you're wearing it for ornament, as a sort of beauty-spot,” + said Sally, “all right. But in case you don't know, you've a smut on your + nose.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, my aunt! Not really?” + </p> + <p> + “Now would I deceive you on an important point like that?” + </p> + <p> + “Do you mind if I have a look in the glass?” + </p> + <p> + “Certainly, if you can stand it.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger moved hurriedly to the dressing-table. + </p> + <p> + “You're perfectly right,” he announced, applying his handkerchief. + </p> + <p> + “I thought I was. I'm very quick at noticing things.” + </p> + <p> + “My hair's a bit rumpled, too.” + </p> + <p> + “Very much so.” + </p> + <p> + “You take my tip,” said Ginger, earnestly, “and never lie about under + beds. There's nothing in it.” + </p> + <p> + “That reminds me. You won't be offended if I asked you something?” + </p> + <p> + “No, no. Go ahead.” + </p> + <p> + “It's rather an impertinent question. You may resent it.” + </p> + <p> + “No, no.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, then, what were you doing under my bed?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, under your bed?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes. Under my bed. This. It's a bed, you know. Mine. My bed. You were + under it. Why? Or putting it another way, why were you under my bed?” + </p> + <p> + “I was hiding.” + </p> + <p> + “Playing hide-and-seek? That explains it.” + </p> + <p> + “Mrs. What's-her-name—Beecher—Meecher—was after me.” + </p> + <p> + Sally shook her head disapprovingly. + </p> + <p> + “You mustn't encourage Mrs. Meecher in these childish pastimes. It + unsettles her.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger passed an agitated hand over his forehead. + </p> + <p> + “It's like this...” + </p> + <p> + “I hate to keep criticizing your appearance,” said Sally, “and personally + I like it; but, when you clutched your brow just then, you put about a + pound of dust on it. Your hands are probably grubby.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger inspected them. + </p> + <p> + “They are!” + </p> + <p> + “Why not make a really good job of it and have a wash?” + </p> + <p> + “Do you mind?” + </p> + <p> + “I'd prefer it.” + </p> + <p> + “Thanks awfully. I mean to say it's your basin, you know, and all that. + What I mean is, seem to be making myself pretty well at home.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, no.” + </p> + <p> + “Touching the matter of soap...” + </p> + <p> + “Use mine. We Americans are famous for our hospitality.” + </p> + <p> + “Thanks awfully.” + </p> + <p> + “The towel is on your right.” + </p> + <p> + “Thanks awfully.” + </p> + <p> + “And I've a clothes brush in my bag.” + </p> + <p> + “Thanks awfully.” + </p> + <p> + Splashing followed like a sea-lion taking a dip. “Now, then,” said Sally, + “why were you hiding from Mrs. Meecher?” + </p> + <p> + A careworn, almost hunted look came into Ginger's face. “I say, you know, + that woman is rather by way of being one of the lads, what! Scares me! + Word was brought that she was on the prowl, so it seemed to me a judicious + move to take cover till she sort of blew over. If she'd found me, she'd + have made me take that dog of hers for a walk.” + </p> + <p> + “Toto?” + </p> + <p> + “Toto. You know,” said Ginger, with a strong sense of injury, “no dog's + got a right to be a dog like that. I don't suppose there's anyone keener + on dogs than I am, but a thing like a woolly rat.” He shuddered slightly. + “Well, one hates to be seen about with it in the public streets.” + </p> + <p> + “Why couldn't you have refused in a firm but gentlemanly manner to take + Toto out?” + </p> + <p> + “Ah! There you rather touch the spot. You see, the fact of the matter is, + I'm a bit behind with the rent, and that makes it rather hard to take what + you might call a firm stand.” + </p> + <p> + “But how can you be behind with the rent? I only left here the Saturday + before last and you weren't in the place then. You can't have been here + more than a week.” + </p> + <p> + “I've been here just a week. That's the week I'm behind with.” + </p> + <p> + “But why? You were a millionaire when I left you at Roville.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, the fact of the matter is, I went back to the tables that night and + lost a goodish bit of what I'd won. And, somehow or another, when I got to + America, the stuff seemed to slip away.” + </p> + <p> + “What made you come to America at all?” said Sally, asking the question + which, she felt, any sensible person would have asked at the opening of + the conversation. + </p> + <p> + One of his familiar blushes raced over Ginger's face. “Oh, I thought I + would. Land of opportunity, you know.” + </p> + <p> + “Have you managed to find any of the opportunities yet?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, I have got a job of sorts, I'm a waiter at a rummy little place on + Second Avenue. The salary isn't big, but I'd have wangled enough out of it + to pay last week's rent, only they docked me a goodish bit for breaking + plates and what not. The fact is, I'm making rather a hash of it.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, Ginger! You oughtn't to be a waiter!” + </p> + <p> + “That's what the boss seems to think.” + </p> + <p> + “I mean, you ought to be doing something ever so much better.” + </p> + <p> + “But what? You've no notion how well all these blighters here seem to be + able to get along without my help. I've tramped all over the place, + offering my services, but they all say they'll try to carry on as they + are.” + </p> + <p> + Sally reflected. + </p> + <p> + “I know!” + </p> + <p> + “What?” + </p> + <p> + “I'll make Fillmore give you a job. I wonder I didn't think of it before.” + </p> + <p> + “Fillmore?” + </p> + <p> + “My brother. Yes, he'll be able to use you.” + </p> + <p> + “What as?” + </p> + <p> + Sally considered. + </p> + <p> + “As a—as a—oh, as his right-hand man.” + </p> + <p> + “Does he want a right-hand man?” + </p> + <p> + “Sure to. He's a young fellow trying to get along. Sure to want a + right-hand man.” + </p> + <p> + “'M yes,” said Ginger reflectively. “Of course, I've never been a + right-hand man, you know.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, you'd pick it up. I'll take you round to him now. He's staying at the + Astor.” + </p> + <p> + “There's just one thing,” said Ginger. + </p> + <p> + “What's that?” + </p> + <p> + “I might make a hash of it.” + </p> + <p> + “Heavens, Ginger! There must be something in this world that you wouldn't + make a hash of. Don't stand arguing any longer. Are you dry? and clean? + Very well, then. Let's be off.” + </p> + <p> + “Right ho.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger took a step towards the door, then paused, rigid, with one leg in + the air, as though some spell had been cast upon him. From the passage + outside there had sounded a shrill yapping. Ginger looked at Sally. Then + he looked—longingly—at the bed. + </p> + <p> + “Don't be such a coward,” said Sally, severely. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, but...” + </p> + <p> + “How much do you owe Mrs. Meecher?” + </p> + <p> + “Round about twelve dollars, I think it is.” + </p> + <p> + “I'll pay her.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger flushed awkwardly. + </p> + <p> + “No, I'm hanged if you will! I mean,” he stammered, “it's frightfully good + of you and all that, and I can't tell you how grateful I am, but honestly, + I couldn't...” + </p> + <p> + Sally did not press the point. She liked him the better for a rugged + independence, which in the days of his impecuniousness her brother + Fillmore had never dreamed of exhibiting. + </p> + <p> + “Very well,” she said. “Have it your own way. Proud. That's me all over, + Mabel. Ginger!” She broke off sharply. “Pull yourself together. Where is + your manly spirit? I'd be ashamed to be such a coward.” + </p> + <p> + “Awfully sorry, but, honestly, that woolly dog...” + </p> + <p> + “Never mind the dog. I'll see you through.” + </p> + <p> + They came out into the passage almost on top of Toto, who was stalking + phantom rats. Mrs. Meecher was manoeuvring in the background. Her face lit + up grimly at the sight of Ginger. + </p> + <p> + “Mister Kemp! I been looking for you.” + </p> + <p> + Sally intervened brightly. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, Mrs. Meecher,” she said, shepherding her young charge through the + danger zone, “I was so surprised to meet Mr. Kemp here. He is a great + friend of mine. We met in France. We're going off now to have a long talk + about old times, and then I'm taking him to see my brother...” + </p> + <p> + “Toto...” + </p> + <p> + “Dear little thing! You ought to take him for a walk,” said Sally. “It's a + lovely day. Mr. Kemp was saying just now that he would have liked to take + him, but we're rather in a hurry and shall probably have to get into a + taxi. You've no idea how busy my brother is just now. If we're late, he'll + never forgive us.” + </p> + <p> + She passed on down the stairs, leaving Mrs. Meecher dissatisfied but + irresolute. There was something about Sally which even in her pre-wealthy + days had always baffled Mrs. Meecher and cramped her style, and now that + she was rich and independent she inspired in the chatelaine of the + boarding-house an emotion which was almost awe. The front door had closed + before Mrs. Meecher had collected her faculties; and Ginger, pausing on + the sidewalk, drew a long breath. + </p> + <p> + “You know, you're wonderful!” he said, regarding Sally with unconcealed + admiration. + </p> + <p> + She accepted the compliment composedly. + </p> + <p> + “Now we'll go and hunt up Fillmore,” she said. “But there's no need to + hurry, of course, really. We'll go for a walk first, and then call at the + Astor and make him give us lunch. I want to hear all about you. I've heard + something already. I met your cousin, Mr. Carmyle. He was on the train + coming from Detroit. Did you know that he was in America?” + </p> + <p> + “No, I've—er—rather lost touch with the Family.” + </p> + <p> + “So I gathered from Mr. Carmyle. And I feel hideously responsible. It was + all through me that all this happened.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, no.” + </p> + <p> + “Of course it was. I made you what you are to-day—I hope I'm + satisfied—I dragged and dragged you down until the soul within you + died, so to speak. I know perfectly well that you wouldn't have dreamed of + savaging the Family as you seem to have done if it hadn't been for what I + said to you at Roville. Ginger, tell me, what did happen? I'm dying to + know. Mr. Carmyle said you insulted your uncle!” + </p> + <p> + “Donald. Yes, we did have a bit of a scrap, as a matter of fact. He made + me go out to dinner with him and we—er—sort of disagreed. To + start with, he wanted me to apologize to old Scrymgeour, and I rather gave + it a miss.” + </p> + <p> + “Noble fellow!” + </p> + <p> + “Scrymgeour?” + </p> + <p> + “No, silly! You.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, ah!” Ginger blushed. “And then there was all that about the soup, you + know.” + </p> + <p> + “How do you mean, 'all that about the soup'? What about the soup? What + soup?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, things sort of hotted up a bit when the soup arrived.” + </p> + <p> + “I don't understand.” + </p> + <p> + “I mean, the trouble seemed to start, as it were, when the waiter had + finished ladling out the mulligatawny. Thick soup, you know.” + </p> + <p> + “I know mulligatawny is a thick soup. Yes?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, my old uncle—I'm not blaming him, don't you know—more + his misfortune than his fault—I can see that now—but he's got + a heavy moustache. Like a walrus, rather, and he's a bit apt to inhale the + stuff through it. And I—well, I asked him not to. It was just a + suggestion, you know. He cut up fairly rough, and by the time the fish + came round we were more or less down on the mat chewing holes in one + another. My fault, probably. I wasn't feeling particularly well-disposed + towards the Family that night. I'd just had a talk with Bruce—my + cousin, you know—in Piccadilly, and that had rather got the wind up + me. Bruce always seems to get on my nerves a bit somehow and—Uncle + Donald asking me to dinner and all that. By the way, did you get the + books?” + </p> + <p> + “What books?” + </p> + <p> + “Bruce said he wanted to send you some books. That was why I gave him your + address.” Sally stared. + </p> + <p> + “He never sent me any books.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, he said he was going to, and I had to tell him where to send them.” + </p> + <p> + Sally walked on, a little thoughtfully. She was not a vain girl, but it + was impossible not to perceive in the light of this fresh evidence that + Mr. Carmyle had made a journey of three thousand miles with the sole + object of renewing his acquaintance with her. It did not matter, of + course, but it was vaguely disturbing. No girl cares to be dogged by a man + she rather dislikes. + </p> + <p> + “Go on telling me about your uncle,” she said. + </p> + <p> + “Well, there's not much more to tell. I'd happened to get that wireless of + yours just before I started out to dinner with him, and I was more or less + feeling that I wasn't going to stand any rot from the Family. I'd got to + the fish course, hadn't I? Well, we managed to get through that somehow, + but we didn't survive the fillet steak. One thing seemed to lead to + another, and the show sort of bust up. He called me a good many things, + and I got a bit fed-up, and finally I told him I hadn't any more use for + the Family and was going to start out on my own. And—well, I did, + don't you know. And here I am.” + </p> + <p> + Sally listened to this saga breathlessly. More than ever did she feel + responsible for her young protégé, and any faint qualms which she had + entertained as to the wisdom of transferring practically the whole of her + patrimony to the care of so erratic a financier as her brother vanished. + It was her plain duty to see that Ginger was started well in the race of + life, and Fillmore was going to come in uncommonly handy. + </p> + <p> + “We'll go to the Astor now,” she said, “and I'll introduce you to + Fillmore. He's a theatrical manager and he's sure to have something for + you.” + </p> + <p> + “It's awfully good of you to bother about me.” + </p> + <p> + “Ginger,” said Sally, “I regard you as a grandson. Hail that cab, will + you?” + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0010" id="link2HCH0010"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER X. SALLY IN THE SHADOWS + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + It seemed to Sally in the weeks that followed her reunion with Ginger Kemp + that a sort of golden age had set in. On all the frontiers of her little + kingdom there was peace and prosperity, and she woke each morning in a + world so neatly smoothed and ironed out that the most captious pessimist + could hardly have found anything in it to criticize. + </p> + <p> + True, Gerald was still a thousand miles away. Going to Chicago to + superintend the opening of “The Primrose Way”; for Fillmore had acceded to + his friend Ike's suggestion in the matter of producing it first in + Chicago, and he had been called in by a distracted manager to revise the + work of a brother dramatist, whose comedy was in difficulties at one of + the theatres in that city; and this meant he would have to remain on the + spot for some time to come. It was disappointing, for Sally had been + looking forward to having him back in New York in a few days; but she + refused to allow herself to be depressed. Life as a whole was much too + satisfactory for that. Life indeed, in every other respect, seemed + perfect. Fillmore was going strong; Ginger was off her conscience; she had + found an apartment; her new hat suited her; and “The Primrose Way” was a + tremendous success. Chicago, it appeared from Fillmore's account, was + paying little attention to anything except “The Primrose Way.” National + problems had ceased to interest the citizens. Local problems left them + cold. Their minds were riveted to the exclusion of all else on the problem + of how to secure seats. The production of the piece, according to + Fillmore, had been the most terrific experience that had come to stir + Chicago since the great fire. + </p> + <p> + Of all these satisfactory happenings, the most satisfactory, to Sally's + thinking, was the fact that the problem of Ginger's future had been + solved. Ginger had entered the service of the Fillmore Nicholas Theatrical + Enterprises Ltd. (Managing Director, Fillmore Nicholas)—Fillmore + would have made the title longer, only that was all that would go on the + brass plate—and was to be found daily in the outer office, his + duties consisting mainly, it seemed, in reading the evening papers. What + exactly he was, even Ginger hardly knew. Sometimes he felt like the man at + the wheel, sometimes like a glorified office boy, and not so very + glorified at that. For the most part he had to prevent the mob rushing and + getting at Fillmore, who sat in semi-regal state in the inner office + pondering great schemes. + </p> + <p> + But, though there might be an occasional passing uncertainty in Ginger's + mind as to just what he was supposed to be doing in exchange for the fifty + dollars he drew every Friday, there was nothing uncertain about his + gratitude to Sally for having pulled the strings and enabled him to do it. + He tried to thank her every time they met, and nowadays they were meeting + frequently; for Ginger was helping her to furnish her new apartment. In + this task, he spared no efforts. He said that it kept him in condition. + </p> + <p> + “And what I mean to say is,” said Ginger, pausing in the act of carrying a + massive easy chair to the third spot which Sally had selected in the last + ten minutes, “if I didn't sweat about a bit and help you after the way you + got me that job...” + </p> + <p> + “Ginger, desist,” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, but honestly...” + </p> + <p> + “If you don't stop it, I'll make you move that chair into the next room.” + </p> + <p> + “Shall I?” Ginger rubbed his blistered hands and took a new grip. + “Anything you say.” + </p> + <p> + “Silly! Of course not. The only other rooms are my bedroom, the bathroom + and the kitchen. What on earth would I want a great lumbering chair in + them for? All the same, I believe the first we chose was the best.” + </p> + <p> + “Back she goes, then, what?” + </p> + <p> + Sally reflected frowningly. This business of setting up house was causing + her much thought. + </p> + <p> + “No,” she decided. “By the window is better.” She looked at him + remorsefully. “I'm giving you a lot of trouble.” + </p> + <p> + “Trouble!” Ginger, accompanied by a chair, staggered across the room. “The + way I look at it is this.” He wiped a bead of perspiration from his + freckled forehead. “You got me that job, and...” + </p> + <p> + “Stop!” + </p> + <p> + “Right ho... Still, you did, you know.” + </p> + <p> + Sally sat down in the armchair and stretched herself. Watching Ginger work + had given her a vicarious fatigue. She surveyed the room proudly. It was + certainly beginning to look cosy. The pictures were up, the carpet down, + the furniture very neatly in order. For almost the first time in her life + she had the restful sensation of being at home. She had always longed, + during the past three years of boarding-house existence, for a settled + abode, a place where she could lock the door on herself and be alone. The + apartment was small, but it was undeniably a haven. She looked about her + and could see no flaw in it... except... She had a sudden sense of + something missing. + </p> + <p> + “Hullo!” she said. “Where's that photograph of me? I'm sure I put it on + the mantelpiece yesterday.” + </p> + <p> + His exertions seemed to have brought the blood to Ginger's face. He was a + rich red. He inspected the mantelpiece narrowly. + </p> + <p> + “No. No photograph here.” + </p> + <p> + “I know there isn't. But it was there yesterday. Or was it? I know I meant + to put it there. Perhaps I forgot. It's the most beautiful thing you ever + saw. Not a bit like me; but what of that? They touch 'em up in the + dark-room, you know. I value it because it looks the way I should like to + look if I could.” + </p> + <p> + “I've never had a beautiful photograph taken of myself,” said Ginger, + solemnly, with gentle regret. + </p> + <p> + “Cheer up!” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I don't mind. I only mentioned...” + </p> + <p> + “Ginger,” said Sally, “pardon my interrupting your remarks, which I know + are valuable, but this chair is—not—right! It ought to be + where it was at the beginning. Could you give your imitation of a + pack-mule just once more? And after that I'll make you some tea. If + there's any tea—or milk—or cups.” + </p> + <p> + “There are cups all right. I know, because I smashed two the day before + yesterday. I'll nip round the corner for some milk, shall I?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, please nip. All this hard work has taken it out of me terribly.” + </p> + <p> + Over the tea-table Sally became inquisitive. + </p> + <p> + “What I can't understand about this job of yours. Ginger—which as + you are just about to observe, I was noble enough to secure for you—is + the amount of leisure that seems to go with it. How is it that you are + able to spend your valuable time—Fillmore's valuable time, rather—juggling + with my furniture every day?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I can usually get off.” + </p> + <p> + “But oughtn't you to be at your post doing—whatever it is you do? + What do you do?” + </p> + <p> + Ginger stirred his tea thoughtfully and gave his mind to the question. + </p> + <p> + “Well, I sort of mess about, you know.” He pondered. “I interview divers + blighters and tell 'em your brother is out and take their names and + addresses and... oh, all that sort of thing.” + </p> + <p> + “Does Fillmore consult you much?” + </p> + <p> + “He lets me read some of the plays that are sent in. Awful tosh most of + them. Sometimes he sends me off to a vaudeville house of an evening.” + </p> + <p> + “As a treat?” + </p> + <p> + “To see some special act, you know. To report on it. In case he might want + to use it for this revue of his.” + </p> + <p> + “Which revue?” + </p> + <p> + “Didn't you know he was going to put on a revue? Oh, rather. A whacking + big affair. Going to cut out the Follies and all that sort of thing.” + </p> + <p> + “But—my goodness!” Sally was alarmed. It was just like Fillmore, she + felt, to go branching out into these expensive schemes when he ought to be + moving warily and trying to consolidate the small success he had had. All + his life he had thought in millions where the prudent man would have been + content with hundreds. An inexhaustible fount of optimism bubbled + eternally within him. “That's rather ambitious,” she said. + </p> + <p> + “Yes. Ambitious sort of cove, your brother. Quite the Napoleon.” + </p> + <p> + “I shall have to talk to him,” said Sally decidedly. She was annoyed with + Fillmore. Everything had been going so beautifully, with everybody + peaceful and happy and prosperous and no anxiety anywhere, till he had + spoiled things. Now she would have to start worrying again. + </p> + <p> + “Of course,” argued Ginger, “there's money in revues. Over in London + fellows make pots out of them.” + </p> + <p> + Sally shook her head. + </p> + <p> + “It won't do,” she said. “And I'll tell you another thing that won't do. + This armchair. Of course it ought to be over by the window. You can see + that yourself, can't you.” + </p> + <p> + “Absolutely!” said Ginger, patiently preparing for action once more. + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + Sally's anxiety with regard to her ebullient brother was not lessened by + the receipt shortly afterwards of a telegram from Miss Winch in Chicago. + </p> + <p> + Have you been feeding Fillmore meat? + </p> + <p> + the telegram ran: and, while Sally could not have claimed that she + completely understood it, there was a sinister suggestion about the + message which decided her to wait no longer before making investigations. + She tore herself away from the joys of furnishing and went round to the + headquarters of the Fillmore Nicholas Theatrical Enterprises Ltd. + (Managing Director, Fillmore Nicholas) without delay. + </p> + <p> + Ginger, she discovered on arrival, was absent from his customary post, his + place in the outer office being taken by a lad of tender years and pimply + exterior, who thawed and cast off a proud reserve on hearing Sally's name, + and told her to walk right in. Sally walked right in, and found Fillmore + with his feet on an untidy desk, studying what appeared to be + costume-designs. + </p> + <p> + “Ah, Sally!” he said in the distrait, tired voice which speaks of vast + preoccupations. Prosperity was still putting in its silent, deadly work on + the Hope of the American Theatre. What, even at as late an epoch as the + return from Detroit, had been merely a smooth fullness around the angle of + the jaw was now frankly and without disguise a double chin. He was wearing + a new waistcoat and it was unbuttoned. “I am rather busy,” he went on. + “Always glad to see you, but I am rather busy. I have a hundred things to + attend to.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, attend to me. That'll only make a hundred and one. Fill, what's all + this I hear about a revue?” + </p> + <p> + Fillmore looked as like a small boy caught in the act of stealing jam as + it is possible for a great theatrical manager to look. He had been + wondering in his darker moments what Sally would say about that project + when she heard of it, and he had hoped that she would not hear of it until + all the preparations were so complete that interference would be + impossible. He was extremely fond of Sally, but there was, he knew, a + lamentable vein of caution in her make-up which might lead her to + criticize. And how can your man of affairs carry on if women are buzzing + round criticizing all the time? He picked up a pen and put it down; + buttoned his waistcoat and unbuttoned it; and scratched his ear with one + of the costume-designs. + </p> + <p> + “Oh yes, the revue!” + </p> + <p> + “It's no good saying 'Oh yes'! You know perfectly well it's a crazy idea.” + </p> + <p> + “Really... these business matters... this interference...” + </p> + <p> + “I don't want to run your affairs for you, Fill, but that money of mine + does make me a sort of partner, I suppose, and I think I have a right to + raise a loud yell of agony when I see you risking it on a...” + </p> + <p> + “Pardon me,” said Fillmore loftily, looking happier. “Let me explain. + Women never understand business matters. Your money is tied up exclusively + in 'The Primrose Way,' which, as you know, is a tremendous success. You + have nothing whatever to worry about as regards any new production I may + make.” + </p> + <p> + “I'm not worrying about the money. I'm worrying about you.” + </p> + <p> + A tolerant smile played about the lower slopes of Fillmore's face. + </p> + <p> + “Don't be alarmed about me. I'm all right.” + </p> + <p> + “You aren't all right. You've no business, when you've only just got + started as a manager, to be rushing into an enormous production like this. + You can't afford it.” + </p> + <p> + “My dear child, as I said before, women cannot understand these things. A + man in my position can always command money for a new venture.” + </p> + <p> + “Do you mean to say you have found somebody silly enough to put up money?” + </p> + <p> + “Certainly. I don't know that there is any secret about it. Your friend, + Mr. Carmyle, has taken an interest in some of my forthcoming productions.” + </p> + <p> + “What!” Sally had been disturbed before, but she was aghast now. + </p> + <p> + This was something she had never anticipated. Bruce Carmyle seemed to be + creeping into her life like an advancing tide. There appeared to be no + eluding him. Wherever she turned, there he was, and she could do nothing + but rage impotently. The situation was becoming impossible. + </p> + <p> + Fillmore misinterpreted the note of dismay in her voice. + </p> + <p> + “It's quite all right,” he assured her. “He's a very rich man. Large + private means, besides his big income. Even if anything goes wrong...” + </p> + <p> + “It isn't that. It's...” + </p> + <p> + The hopelessness of explaining to Fillmore stopped Sally. And while she + was chafing at this new complication which had come to upset the orderly + routine of her life there was an outburst of voices in the other office. + Ginger's understudy seemed to be endeavouring to convince somebody that + the Big Chief was engaged and not to be intruded upon. In this he was + unsuccessful, for the door opened tempestuously and Miss Winch sailed in. + </p> + <p> + “Fillmore, you poor nut,” said Miss Winch, for though she might wrap up + her meaning somewhat obscurely in her telegraphic communications, when it + came to the spoken word she was directness itself, “stop picking straws in + your hair and listen to me. You're dippy!” + </p> + <p> + The last time Sally had seen Fillmore's fiancée, she had been impressed by + her imperturbable calm. Miss Winch, in Detroit, had seemed a girl whom + nothing could ruffle. That she had lapsed now from this serene placidity, + struck Sally as ominous. Slightly though she knew her, she felt that it + could be no ordinary happening that had so animated her + sister-in-law-to-be. + </p> + <p> + “Ah! Here you are!” said Fillmore. He had started to his feet indignantly + at the opening of the door, like a lion bearded in its den, but calm had + returned when he saw who the intruder was. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, here I am!” Miss Winch dropped despairingly into a swivel-chair, and + endeavoured to restore herself with a stick of chewing-gum. “Fillmore, + darling, you're the sweetest thing on earth, and I love you, but on + present form you could just walk straight into Bloomingdale and they'd + give you the royal suite.” + </p> + <p> + “My dear girl...” + </p> + <p> + “What do you think?” demanded Miss Winch, turning to Sally. + </p> + <p> + “I've just been telling him,” said Sally, welcoming this ally, “I think + it's absurd at this stage of things for him to put on an enormous + revue...” + </p> + <p> + “Revue?” Miss Winch stopped in the act of gnawing her gum. “What revue?” + She flung up her arms. “I shall have to swallow this gum,” she said. “You + can't chew with your head going round. Are you putting on a revue too?” + </p> + <p> + Fillmore was buttoning and unbuttoning his waistcoat. He had a hounded + look. + </p> + <p> + “Certainly, certainly,” he replied in a tone of some feverishness. “I wish + you girls would leave me to manage...” + </p> + <p> + “Dippy!” said Miss Winch once more. “Telegraphic address: Tea-Pot, + Matteawan.” She swivelled round to Sally again. “Say, listen! This boy + must be stopped. We must form a gang in his best interests and get him put + away. What do you think he proposes doing? I'll give you three guesses. + Oh, what's the use? You'd never hit it. This poor wandering lad has got it + all fixed up to star me—me—in a new show!” + </p> + <p> + Fillmore removed a hand from his waistcoat buttons and waved it + protestingly. + </p> + <p> + “I have used my own judgment...” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, sir!” proceeded Miss Winch, riding over the interruption. “That's + what he's planning to spring on an unsuspicious public. I'm sitting + peacefully in my room at the hotel in Chicago, pronging a few cents' worth + of scrambled eggs and reading the morning paper, when the telephone rings. + Gentleman below would like to see me. Oh, ask him to wait. Business of + flinging on a few clothes. Down in elevator. Bright sunrise effects in + lobby.” + </p> + <p> + “What on earth do you mean?” + </p> + <p> + “The gentleman had a head of red hair which had to be seen to be + believed,” explained Miss Winch. “Lit up the lobby. Management had + switched off all the electrics for sake of economy. An Englishman he was. + Nice fellow. Named Kemp.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, is Ginger in Chicago?” said Sally. “I wondered why he wasn't on his + little chair in the outer office. + </p> + <p> + “I sent Kemp to Chicago,” said Fillmore, “to have a look at the show. It + is my policy, if I am unable to pay periodical visits myself, to send a + representative...” + </p> + <p> + “Save it up for the long winter evenings,” advised Miss Winch, cutting in + on this statement of managerial tactics. “Mr. Kemp may have been there to + look at the show, but his chief reason for coming was to tell me to beat + it back to New York to enter into my kingdom. Fillmore wanted me on the + spot, he told me, so that I could sit around in this office here, + interviewing my supporting company. Me! Can you or can you not,” inquired + Miss Winch frankly, “tie it?” + </p> + <p> + “Well...” Sally hesitated. + </p> + <p> + “Don't say it! I know it just as well as you do. It's too sad for words.” + </p> + <p> + “You persist in underestimating your abilities, Gladys,” said Fillmore + reproachfully. “I have had a certain amount of experience in theatrical + matters—I have seen a good deal of acting—and I assure you + that as a character-actress you...” + </p> + <p> + Miss Winch rose swiftly from her seat, kissed Fillmore energetically, and + sat down again. She produced another stick of chewing-gum, then shook her + head and replaced it in her bag. + </p> + <p> + “You're a darling old thing to talk like that,” she said, “and I hate to + wake you out of your daydreams, but, honestly, Fillmore, dear, do just + step out of the padded cell for one moment and listen to reason. I know + exactly what has been passing in your poor disordered bean. You took Elsa + Doland out of a minor part and made her a star overnight. She goes to + Chicago, and the critics and everybody else rave about her. As a matter of + fact,” she said to Sally with enthusiasm, for hers was an honest and + generous nature, “you can't realize, not having seen her play there, what + an amazing hit she has made. She really is a sensation. Everybody says + she's going to be the biggest thing on record. Very well, then, what does + Fillmore do? The poor fish claps his hand to his forehead and cries + 'Gadzooks! An idea! I've done it before, I'll do it again. I'm the fellow + who can make a star out of anything.' And he picks on me!” + </p> + <p> + “My dear girl...” + </p> + <p> + “Now, the flaw in the scheme is this. Elsa is a genius, and if he hadn't + made her a star somebody else would have done. But little Gladys? That's + something else again.” She turned to Sally. “You've seen me in action, and + let me tell you you've seen me at my best. Give me a maid's part, with a + tray to carry on in act one and a couple of 'Yes, madam's' in act two, and + I'm there! Ellen Terry hasn't anything on me when it comes to saying 'Yes, + madam,' and I'm willing to back myself for gold, notes, or lima beans + against Sarah Bernhardt as a tray-carrier. But there I finish. That lets + me out. And anybody who thinks otherwise is going to lose a lot of money. + Between ourselves the only thing I can do really well is to cook...” + </p> + <p> + “My dear Gladys!” cried Fillmore revolted. + </p> + <p> + “I'm a heaven-born cook, and I don't mind notifying the world to that + effect. I can cook a chicken casserole so that you would leave home and + mother for it. Also my English pork-pies! One of these days I'll take an + afternoon off and assemble one for you. You'd be surprised! But acting—no. + I can't do it, and I don't want to do it. I only went on the stage for + fun, and my idea of fun isn't to plough through a star part with all the + critics waving their axes in the front row, and me knowing all the time + that it's taking money out of Fillmore's bankroll that ought to be going + towards buying the little home with stationary wash-tubs... Well, that's + that, Fillmore, old darling. I thought I'd just mention it.” + </p> + <p> + Sally could not help being sorry for Fillmore. He was sitting with his + chin on his hands, staring moodily before him—Napoleon at Elba. It + was plain that this project of taking Miss Winch by the scruff of the neck + and hurling her to the heights had been very near his heart. + </p> + <p> + “If that's how you feel,” he said in a stricken voice, “there is nothing + more to say.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, yes there is. We will now talk about this revue of yours. It's off!” + </p> + <p> + Fillmore bounded to his feet; he thumped the desk with a well-nourished + fist. A man can stand just so much. + </p> + <p> + “It is not off! Great heavens! It's too much! I will not put up with this + interference with my business concerns. I will not be tied and hampered. + Here am I, a man of broad vision and... and... broad vision... I form my + plans... my plans... I form them... I shape my schemes... and what + happens? A horde of girls flock into my private office while I am + endeavouring to concentrate... and concentrate... I won't stand it. + Advice, yes. Interference, no. I... I... I... and kindly remember that!” + </p> + <p> + The door closed with a bang. A fainter detonation announced the whirlwind + passage through the outer office. Footsteps died away down the corridor. + </p> + <p> + Sally looked at Miss Winch, stunned. A roused and militant Fillmore was + new to her. + </p> + <p> + Miss Winch took out the stick of chewing-gum again and unwrapped it. + </p> + <p> + “Isn't he cute!” she said. “I hope he doesn't get the soft kind,” she + murmured, chewing reflectively. + </p> + <p> + “The soft kind.” + </p> + <p> + “He'll be back soon with a box of candy,” explained Miss Winch, “and he + will get that sloshy, creamy sort, though I keep telling him I like the + other. Well, one thing's certain. Fillmore's got it up his nose. He's + beginning to hop about and sing in the sunlight. It's going to be hard + work to get that boy down to earth again.” Miss Winch heaved a gentle + sigh. “I should like him to have enough left in the old stocking to pay + the first year's rent when the wedding bells ring out.” She bit + meditatively on her chewing-gum. “Not,” she said, “that it matters. I'd be + just as happy in two rooms and a kitchenette, so long as Fillmore was + there. You've no notion how dippy I am about him.” Her freckled face + glowed. “He grows on me like a darned drug. And the funny thing is that I + keep right on admiring him though I can see all the while that he's the + most perfect chump. He is a chump, you know. That's what I love about him. + That and the way his ears wiggle when he gets excited. Chumps always make + the best husbands. When you marry, Sally, grab a chump. Tap his forehead + first, and if it rings solid, don't hesitate. All the unhappy marriages + come from the husband having brains. What good are brains to a man? They + only unsettle him.” She broke off and scrutinized Sally closely. “Say, + what do you do with your skin?” + </p> + <p> + She spoke with solemn earnestness which made Sally laugh. + </p> + <p> + “What do I do with my skin? I just carry it around with me.” + </p> + <p> + “Well,” said Miss Winch enviously, “I wish I could train my darned fool of + a complexion to get that way. Freckles are the devil. When I was eight I + had the finest collection in the Middle West, and I've been adding to it + right along. Some folks say lemon-juice'll cure 'em. Mine lap up all I + give 'em and ask for more. There's only one way of getting rid of + freckles, and that is to saw the head off at the neck.” + </p> + <p> + “But why do you want to get rid of them?” + </p> + <p> + “Why? Because a sensitive girl, anxious to retain her future husband's + love, doesn't enjoy going about looking like something out of a dime + museum.” + </p> + <p> + “How absurd! Fillmore worships freckles.” + </p> + <p> + “Did he tell you so?” asked Miss Winch eagerly. + </p> + <p> + “Not in so many words, but you can see it in his eye.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, he certainly asked me to marry him, knowing all about them, I will + say that. And, what's more, I don't think feminine loveliness means much + to Fillmore, or he'd never have picked on me. Still, it is calculated to + give a girl a jar, you must admit, when she picks up a magazine and reads + an advertisement of a face-cream beginning, 'Your husband is growing cold + to you. Can you blame him? Have you really tried to cure those unsightly + blemishes?'—meaning what I've got. Still, I haven't noticed Fillmore + growing cold to me, so maybe it's all right.” + </p> + <p> + It was a subdued Sally who received Ginger when he called at her apartment + a few days later on his return from Chicago. It seemed to her, thinking + over the recent scene, that matters were even worse than she had feared. + This absurd revue, which she had looked on as a mere isolated outbreak of + foolishness, was, it would appear, only a specimen of the sort of thing + her misguided brother proposed to do, a sample selected at random from a + wholesale lot of frantic schemes. Fillmore, there was no longer any room + for doubt, was preparing to express his great soul on a vast scale. And + she could not dissuade him. A humiliating thought. She had grown so + accustomed through the years to being the dominating mind that this revolt + from her authority made her feel helpless and inadequate. Her + self-confidence was shaken. + </p> + <p> + And Bruce Carmyle was financing him... It was illogical, but Sally could + not help feeling that when—she had not the optimism to say “if”—he + lost his money, she would somehow be under an obligation to him, as if the + disaster had been her fault. She disliked, with a whole-hearted intensity, + the thought of being under an obligation to Mr. Carmyle. + </p> + <p> + Ginger said he had looked in to inspect the furniture on the chance that + Sally might want it shifted again: but Sally had no criticisms to make on + that subject. Weightier matters occupied her mind. She sat Ginger down in + the armchair and started to pour out her troubles. It soothed her to talk + to him. In a world which had somehow become chaotic again after an all too + brief period of peace, he was solid and consoling. + </p> + <p> + “I shouldn't worry,” observed Ginger with Winch-like calm, when she had + finished drawing for him the picture of a Fillmore rampant against a + background of expensive revues. Sally nearly shook him. + </p> + <p> + “It's all very well to tell me not to worry,” she cried. “How can I help + worrying? Fillmore's simply a baby, and he's just playing the fool. He has + lost his head completely. And I can't stop him! That is the awful part of + it. I used to be able to look him in the eye, and he would wag his tail + and crawl back into his basket, but now I seem to have no influence at all + over him. He just snorts and goes on running round in circles, breathing + fire.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger did not abandon his attempts to indicate the silver lining. + </p> + <p> + “I think you are making too much of all this, you know. I mean to say, + it's quite likely he's found some mug... what I mean is, it's just + possible that your brother isn't standing the entire racket himself. + Perhaps some rich Johnnie has breezed along with a pot of money. It often + happens like that, you know. You read in the paper that some manager or + other is putting on some show or other, when really the chap who's + actually supplying the pieces of eight is some anonymous lad in the + background.” + </p> + <p> + “That is just what has happened, and it makes it worse than ever. Fillmore + tells me that your cousin, Mr. Carmyle, is providing the money.” + </p> + <p> + This did interest Ginger. He sat up with a jerk. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I say!” he exclaimed. + </p> + <p> + “Yes,” said Sally, still agitated but pleased that she had at last shaken + him out of his trying attitude of detachment. + </p> + <p> + Ginger was scowling. + </p> + <p> + “That's a bit off,” he observed. + </p> + <p> + “I think so, too.” + </p> + <p> + “I don't like that.” + </p> + <p> + “Nor do I.” + </p> + <p> + “Do you know what I think?” said Ginger, ever a man of plain speech and a + reckless plunger into delicate subjects. “The blighter's in love with + you.” + </p> + <p> + Sally flushed. After examining the evidence before her, she had reached + the same conclusion in the privacy of her thoughts, but it embarrassed her + to hear the thing put into bald words. + </p> + <p> + “I know Bruce,” continued Ginger, “and, believe me, he isn't the sort of + cove to take any kind of flutter without a jolly good motive. Of course, + he's got tons of money. His old guvnor was the Carmyle of Carmyle, Brent + & Co.—coal mines up in Wales, and all that sort of thing—and + I suppose he must have left Bruce something like half a million. No need + for the fellow to have worked at all, if he hadn't wanted to. As far as + having the stuff goes, he's in a position to back all the shows he wants + to. But the point is, it's right out of his line. He doesn't do that sort + of thing. Not a drop of sporting blood in the chap. Why I've known him + stick the whole family on to me just because it got noised about that I'd + dropped a couple of quid on the Grand National. If he's really brought + himself to the point of shelling out on a risky proposition like a show, + it means something, take my word for it. And I don't see what else it can + mean except... well, I mean to say, is it likely that he's doing it simply + to make your brother look on him as a good egg and a pal, and all that + sort of thing?” + </p> + <p> + “No, it's not,” agreed Sally. “But don't let's talk about it any more. + Tell me all about your trip to Chicago.” + </p> + <p> + “All right. But, returning to this binge for a moment, I don't see how it + matters to you one way or the other. You're engaged to another fellow, and + when Bruce rolls up and says: 'What about it?' you've simply to tell him + that the shot isn't on the board and will he kindly melt away. Then you + hand him his hat and out he goes.” + </p> + <p> + Sally gave a troubled laugh. + </p> + <p> + “You think that's simple, do you? I suppose you imagine that a girl enjoys + that sort of thing? Oh, what's the use of talking about it? It's horrible, + and no amount of arguing will make it anything else. Do let's change the + subject. How did you like Chicago?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, all right. Rather a grubby sort of place.” + </p> + <p> + “So I've always heard. But you ought not to mind that, being a Londoner.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I didn't mind it. As a matter of fact, I had rather a good time. Saw + one or two shows, you know. Got in on my face as your brother's + representative, which was all to the good. By the way, it's rummy how you + run into people when you move about, isn't it?” + </p> + <p> + “You talk as if you had been dashing about the streets with your eyes + shut. Did you meet somebody you knew?” + </p> + <p> + “Chap I hadn't seen for years. Was at school with him, as a matter of + fact. Fellow named Foster. But I expect you know him, too, don't you? By + name, at any rate. He wrote your brother's show.” + </p> + <p> + Sally's heart jumped. + </p> + <p> + “Oh! Did you meet Gerald—Foster?” + </p> + <p> + “Ran into him one night at the theatre.” + </p> + <p> + “And you were really at school with him?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes. He was in the footer team with me my last year.” + </p> + <p> + “Was he a scrum-half, too?” asked Sally, dimpling. + </p> + <p> + Ginger looked shocked. + </p> + <p> + “You don't have two scrum-halves in a team,” he said, pained at this + ignorance on a vital matter. “The scrum-half is the half who works the + scrum and...” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, you told me that at Roville. What was Gerald—Mr. Foster then? + A six and seven-eighths, or something?” + </p> + <p> + “He was a wing-three,” said Ginger with a gravity befitting his theme. + “Rather fast, with a fairly decent swerve. But he would not learn to give + the reverse pass inside to the centre.” + </p> + <p> + “Ghastly!” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + “If,” said Ginger earnestly, “a wing's bottled up by his wing and the + back, the only thing he can do, if he doesn't want to be bundled into + touch, is to give the reverse pass.” + </p> + <p> + “I know,” said Sally. “If I've thought that once, I've thought it a + hundred times. How nice it must have been for you meeting again. I suppose + you had all sorts of things to talk about?” + </p> + <p> + Ginger shook his head. + </p> + <p> + “Not such a frightful lot. We were never very thick. You see, this chap + Foster was by way of being a bit of a worm.” + </p> + <p> + “What!” + </p> + <p> + “A tick,” explained Ginger. “A rotter. He was pretty generally barred at + school. Personally, I never had any use for him at all.” + </p> + <p> + Sally stiffened. She had liked Ginger up to that moment, and later on, no + doubt, she would resume her liking for him: but in the immediate moment + which followed these words she found herself regarding him with stormy + hostility. How dare he sit there saying things like that about Gerald? + </p> + <p> + Ginger, who was lighting a cigarette without a care in the world, + proceeded to develop his theme. + </p> + <p> + “It's a rummy thing about school. Generally, if a fellow's good at games—in + the cricket team or the footer team and so forth—he can hardly help + being fairly popular. But this blighter Foster somehow—nobody seemed + very keen on him. Of course, he had a few of his own pals, but most of the + chaps rather gave him a miss. It may have been because he was a bit + sidey... had rather an edge on him, you know... Personally, the reason I + barred him was because he wasn't straight. You didn't notice it if you + weren't thrown a goodish bit with him, of course, but he and I were in the + same house, and...” + </p> + <p> + Sally managed to control her voice, though it shook a little. + </p> + <p> + “I ought to tell you,” she said, and her tone would have warned him had he + been less occupied, “that Mr. Foster is a great friend of mine.” + </p> + <p> + But Ginger was intent on the lighting of his cigarette, a delicate + operation with the breeze blowing in through the open window. His head was + bent, and he had formed his hands into a protective framework which half + hid his face. + </p> + <p> + “If you take my tip,” he mumbled, “you'll drop him. He's a wrong 'un.” + </p> + <p> + He spoke with the absent-minded drawl of preoccupation, and Sally could + keep the conflagration under no longer. She was aflame from head to foot. + </p> + <p> + “It may interest you to know,” she said, shooting the words out like + bullets from between clenched teeth, “that Gerald Foster is the man I am + engaged to marry.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger's head came slowly up from his cupped hands. Amazement was in his + eyes, and a sort of horror. The cigarette hung limply from his mouth. He + did not speak, but sat looking at her, dazed. Then the match burnt his + fingers, and he dropped it with a start. The sharp sting of it seemed to + wake him. He blinked. + </p> + <p> + “You're joking,” he said, feebly. There was a note of wistfulness in his + voice. “It isn't true?” + </p> + <p> + Sally kicked the leg of her chair irritably. She read insolent disapproval + into the words. He was daring to criticize... + </p> + <p> + “Of course it's true...” + </p> + <p> + “But...” A look of hopeless misery came into Ginger's pleasant face. He + hesitated. Then, with the air of a man bracing himself to a dreadful, but + unavoidable, ordeal, he went on. He spoke gruffly, and his eyes, which had + been fixed on Sally's, wandered down to the match on the carpet. It was + still glowing, and mechanically he put a foot on it. + </p> + <p> + “Foster's married,” he said shortly. “He was married the day before I left + Chicago.” + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + It seemed to Ginger that in the silence which followed, brooding over the + room like a living presence, even the noises in the street had ceased, as + though what he had said had been a spell cutting Sally and himself off + from the outer world. Only the little clock on the mantelpiece ticked—ticked—ticked, + like a heart beating fast. + </p> + <p> + He stared straight before him, conscious of a strange rigidity. He felt + incapable of movement, as he had sometimes felt in nightmares; and not for + all the wealth of America could he have raised his eyes just then to + Sally's face. He could see her hands. They had tightened on the arm of the + chair. The knuckles were white. + </p> + <p> + He was blaming himself bitterly now for his oafish clumsiness in blurting + out the news so abruptly. And yet, curiously, in his remorse there was + something of elation. Never before had he felt so near to her. It was as + though a barrier that had been between them had fallen. + </p> + <p> + Something moved... It was Sally's hand, slowly relaxing. The fingers + loosened their grip, tightened again, then, as if reluctantly relaxed once + more. The blood flowed back. + </p> + <p> + “Your cigarette's out.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger started violently. Her voice, coming suddenly out of the silence, + had struck him like a blow. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, thanks!” + </p> + <p> + He forced himself to light another match. It sputtered noisily in the + stillness. He blew it out, and the uncanny quiet fell again. + </p> + <p> + Ginger drew at his cigarette mechanically. For an instant he had seen + Sally's face, white-cheeked and bright-eyed, the chin tilted like a flag + flying over a stricken field. His mood changed. All his emotions had + crystallized into a dull, futile rage, a helpless fury directed at a man a + thousand miles away. + </p> + <p> + Sally spoke again. Her voice sounded small and far off, an odd flatness in + it. + </p> + <p> + “Married?” + </p> + <p> + Ginger threw his cigarette out of the window. He was shocked to find that + he was smoking. Nothing could have been farther from his intention than to + smoke. He nodded. + </p> + <p> + “Whom has he married?” + </p> + <p> + Ginger coughed. Something was sticking in his throat, and speech was + difficult. + </p> + <p> + “A girl called Doland.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, Elsa Doland?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes.” + </p> + <p> + “Elsa Doland.” Sally drummed with her fingers on the arm of the chair. + “Oh, Elsa Doland?” + </p> + <p> + There was silence again. The little clock ticked fussily on the + mantelpiece. Out in the street automobile horns were blowing. From + somewhere in the distance came faintly the rumble of an elevated train. + Familiar sounds, but they came to Sally now with a curious, unreal sense + of novelty. She felt as though she had been projected into another world + where everything was new and strange and horrible—everything except + Ginger. About him, in the mere sight of him, there was something known and + heartening. + </p> + <p> + Suddenly, she became aware that she was feeling that Ginger was behaving + extremely well. She seemed to have been taken out of herself and to be + regarding the scene from outside, regarding it coolly and critically; and + it was plain to her that Ginger, in this upheaval of all things, was + bearing himself perfectly. He had attempted no banal words of sympathy. He + had said nothing and he was not looking at her. And Sally felt that + sympathy just now would be torture, and that she could not have borne to + be looked at. + </p> + <p> + Ginger was wonderful. In that curious, detached spirit that had come upon + her, she examined him impartially, and gratitude welled up from the very + depths of her. There he sat, saying nothing and doing nothing, as if he + knew that all she needed, the only thing that could keep her sane in this + world of nightmare, was the sight of that dear, flaming head of his that + made her feel that the world had not slipped away from her altogether. + </p> + <p> + Ginger did not move. The room had grown almost dark now. A spear of light + from a street lamp shone in through the window. + </p> + <p> + Sally got up abruptly. Slowly, gradually, inch by inch, the great + suffocating cloud which had been crushing her had lifted. She felt alive + again. Her black hour had gone, and she was back in the world of living + things once more. She was afire with a fierce, tearing pain that tormented + her almost beyond endurance, but dimly she sensed the fact that she had + passed through something that was worse than pain, and, with Ginger's + stolid presence to aid her, had passed triumphantly. + </p> + <p> + “Go and have dinner, Ginger,” she said. “You must be starving.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger came to life like a courtier in the palace of the Sleeping Beauty. + He shook himself, and rose stiffly from his chair. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, no,” he said. “Not a bit, really.” + </p> + <p> + Sally switched on the light and set him blinking. She could bear to be + looked at now. + </p> + <p> + “Go and dine,” she said. “Dine lavishly and luxuriously. You've certainly + earned...” Her voice faltered for a moment. She held out her hand. + “Ginger,” she said shakily, “I... Ginger, you're a pal.” + </p> + <p> + When he had gone. Sally sat down and began to cry. Then she dried her eyes + in a business-like manner. + </p> + <p> + “There, Miss Nicholas!” she said. “You couldn't have done that an hour + ago... We will now boil you an egg for your dinner and see how that suits + you!” + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0011" id="link2HCH0011"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XI. SALLY RUNS AWAY + </h2> + <p> + If Ginger Kemp had been asked to enumerate his good qualities, it is not + probable that he would have drawn up a very lengthy list. He might have + started by claiming for himself the virtue of meaning well, but after that + he would have had to chew the pencil in prolonged meditation. And, even if + he could eventually have added one or two further items to the catalogue, + tact and delicacy of feeling would not have been among them. + </p> + <p> + Yet, by staying away from Sally during the next few days he showed + considerable delicacy. It was not easy to stay away from her, but he + forced himself to do so. He argued from his own tastes, and was strongly + of opinion that in times of travail, solitude was what the sufferer most + desired. In his time he, too, had had what he would have described as + nasty jars, and on these occasions all he had asked was to be allowed to + sit and think things over and fight his battle out by himself. + </p> + <p> + By Saturday, however, he had come to the conclusion that some form of + action might now be taken. Saturday was rather a good day for picking up + the threads again. He had not to go to the office, and, what was still + more to the point, he had just drawn his week's salary. Mrs. Meecher had + deftly taken a certain amount of this off him, but enough remained to + enable him to attempt consolation on a fairly princely scale. There + presented itself to him as a judicious move the idea of hiring a car and + taking Sally out to dinner at one of the road-houses he had heard about up + the Boston Post Road. He examined the scheme. The more he looked at it, + the better it seemed. + </p> + <p> + He was helped to this decision by the extraordinary perfection of the + weather. The weather of late had been a revelation to Ginger. It was his + first experience of America's Indian Summer, and it had quite overcome + him. As he stood on the roof of Mrs. Meecher's establishment on the + Saturday morning, thrilled by the velvet wonder of the sunshine, it seemed + to him that the only possible way of passing such a day was to take Sally + for a ride in an open car. + </p> + <p> + The Maison Meecher was a lofty building on one of the side-streets at the + lower end of the avenue. From its roof, after you had worked your way + through the groves of washing which hung limply from the clothes-line, you + could see many things of interest. To the left lay Washington Square, full + of somnolent Italians and roller-skating children; to the right was a + spectacle which never failed to intrigue Ginger, the high smoke-stacks of + a Cunard liner moving slowly down the river, sticking up over the + house-tops as if the boat was travelling down Ninth Avenue. + </p> + <p> + To-day there were four of these funnels, causing Ginger to deduce the + Mauritania. As the boat on which he had come over from England, the + Mauritania had a sentimental interest for him. He stood watching her + stately progress till the higher buildings farther down the town shut her + from his sight; then picked his way through the washing and went down to + his room to get his hat. A quarter of an hour later he was in the hall-way + of Sally's apartment house, gazing with ill-concealed disgust at the + serge-clad back of his cousin Mr. Carmyle, who was engaged in conversation + with a gentleman in overalls. + </p> + <p> + No care-free prospector, singing his way through the Mojave Desert and + suddenly finding himself confronted by a rattlesnake, could have + experienced so abrupt a change of mood as did Ginger at this revolting + spectacle. Even in their native Piccadilly it had been unpleasant to run + into Mr. Carmyle. To find him here now was nothing short of nauseating. + Only one thing could have brought him to this place. Obviously, he must + have come to see Sally; and with a sudden sinking of the heart Ginger + remembered the shiny, expensive automobile which he had seen waiting at + the door. He, it was clear, was not the only person to whom the idea had + occurred of taking Sally for a drive on this golden day. + </p> + <p> + He was still standing there when Mr. Carmyle swung round with a frown on + his dark face which seemed to say that he had not found the janitor's + conversation entertaining. The sight of Ginger plainly did nothing to + lighten his gloom. + </p> + <p> + “Hullo!” he said. + </p> + <p> + “Hullo!” said Ginger. + </p> + <p> + Uncomfortable silence followed these civilities. + </p> + <p> + “Have you come to see Miss Nicholas?” + </p> + <p> + “Why, yes.” + </p> + <p> + “She isn't here,” said Mr. Carmyle, and the fact that he had found someone + to share the bad news, seemed to cheer him a little. + </p> + <p> + “Not here?” + </p> + <p> + “No. Apparently...” Bruce Carmyle's scowl betrayed that resentment which a + well-balanced man cannot but feel at the unreasonableness of others. “... + Apparently, for some extraordinary reason, she has taken it into her head + to dash over to England.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger tottered. The unexpectedness of the blow was crushing. He followed + his cousin out into the sunshine in a sort of dream. Bruce Carmyle was + addressing the driver of the expensive automobile. + </p> + <p> + “I find I shall not want the car. You can take it back to the garage.” + </p> + <p> + The chauffeur, a moody man, opened one half-closed eye and spat + cautiously. It was the way Rockefeller would have spat when approaching + the crisis of some delicate financial negotiation. + </p> + <p> + “You'll have to pay just the same,” he observed, opening his other eye to + lend emphasis to the words. + </p> + <p> + “Of course I shall pay,” snapped Mr. Carmyle, irritably. “How much is it?” + </p> + <p> + Money passed. The car rolled off. + </p> + <p> + “Gone to England?” said Ginger, dizzily. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, gone to England.” + </p> + <p> + “But why?” + </p> + <p> + “How the devil do I know why?” Bruce Carmyle would have found his best + friend trying at this moment. Gaping Ginger gave him almost a physical + pain. “All I know is what the janitor told me, that she sailed on the + Mauretania this morning.” + </p> + <p> + The tragic irony of this overcame Ginger. That he should have stood on the + roof, calmly watching the boat down the river... + </p> + <p> + He nodded absently to Mr. Carmyle and walked off. He had no further + remarks to make. The warmth had gone out of the sunshine and all interest + had departed from his life. He felt dull, listless, at a loose end. Not + even the thought that his cousin, a careful man with his money, had had to + pay a day's hire for a car which he could not use brought him any balm. He + loafed aimlessly about the streets. He wandered in the Park and out again. + The Park bored him. The streets bored him. The whole city bored him. A + city without Sally in it was a drab, futile city, and nothing that the sun + could do to brighten it could make it otherwise. + </p> + <p> + Night came at last, and with it a letter. It was the first even passably + pleasant thing that had happened to Ginger in the whole of this dreary and + unprofitable day: for the envelope bore the crest of the good ship + Mauretania. He snatched it covetously from the letter-rack, and carried it + upstairs to his room. + </p> + <p> + Very few of the rooms at Mrs. Meecher's boarding-house struck any note of + luxury. Mrs. Meecher was not one of your fashionable interior decorators. + She considered that when she had added a Morris chair to the essentials + which make up a bedroom, she had gone as far in the direction of pomp as + any guest at seven-and-a-half per could expect her to go. As a rule, the + severity of his surroundings afflicted Ginger with a touch of gloom when + he went to bed; but to-night—such is the magic of a letter from the + right person—he was uplifted and almost gay. There are moments when + even illuminated texts over the wash-stand cannot wholly quell us. + </p> + <p> + There was nothing of haste and much of ceremony in Ginger's method of + approaching the perusal of his correspondence. He bore himself after the + manner of a small boy in the presence of unexpected ice-cream, gloating + for awhile before embarking on the treat, anxious to make it last out. His + first move was to feel in the breast-pocket of his coat and produce the + photograph of Sally which he had feloniously removed from her apartment. + At this he looked long and earnestly before propping it up within easy + reach against his basin, to be handy, if required, for purposes of + reference. He then took off his coat, collar, and shoes, filled and lit a + pipe, placed pouch and matches on the arm of the Morris chair, and drew + that chair up so that he could sit with his feet on the bed. Having + manoeuvred himself into a position of ease, he lit his pipe again and took + up the letter. He looked at the crest, the handwriting of the address, and + the postmark. He weighed it in his hand. It was a bulky letter. + </p> + <p> + He took Sally's photograph from the wash-stand and scrutinized it once + more. Then he lit his pipe again, and, finally, wriggling himself into the + depths of the chair, opened the envelope. + </p> + <p> + “Ginger, dear.” + </p> + <p> + Having read so far, Ginger found it necessary to take up the photograph + and study it with an even greater intentness than before. He gazed at it + for many minutes, then laid it down and lit his pipe again. Then he went + on with the letter. + </p> + <p> + “Ginger, dear—I'm afraid this address is going to give you rather a + shock, and I'm feeling very guilty. I'm running away, and I haven't even + stopped to say good-bye. I can't help it. I know it's weak and cowardly, + but I simply can't help it. I stood it for a day or two, and then I saw + that it was no good. (Thank you for leaving me alone and not coming round + to see me. Nobody else but you would have done that. But then, nobody ever + has been or ever could be so understanding as you.)” + </p> + <p> + Ginger found himself compelled at this point to look at the photograph + again. + </p> + <p> + “There was too much in New York to remind me. That's the worst of being + happy in a place. When things go wrong you find there are too many ghosts + about. I just couldn't stand it. I tried, but I couldn't. I'm going away + to get cured—if I can. Mr. Faucitt is over in England, and when I + went down to Mrs. Meecher for my letters, I found one from him. His + brother is dead, you know, and he has inherited, of all things, a + fashionable dress-making place in Regent Street. His brother was Laurette + et Cie. I suppose he will sell the business later on, but, just at + present, the poor old dear is apparently quite bewildered and that doesn't + seem to have occurred to him. He kept saying in his letter how much he + wished I was with him, to help him, and I was tempted and ran. Anything to + get away from the ghosts and have something to do. I don't suppose I shall + feel much better in England, but, at least, every street corner won't have + associations. Don't ever be happy anywhere, Ginger. It's too big a risk, + much too big a risk. + </p> + <p> + “There was a letter from Elsa Doland, too. Bubbling over with affection. + We had always been tremendous friends. Of course, she never knew anything + about my being engaged to Gerald. I lent Fillmore the money to buy that + piece, which gave Elsa her first big chance, and so she's very grateful. + She says, if ever she gets the opportunity of doing me a good turn... + Aren't things muddled? + </p> + <p> + “And there was a letter from Gerald. I was expecting one, of course, + but... what would you have done, Ginger? Would you have read it? I sat + with it in front of me for an hour, I should think, just looking at the + envelope, and then... You see, what was the use? I could guess exactly the + sort of thing that would be in it, and reading it would only have hurt a + lot more. The thing was done, so why bother about explanations? What good + are explanations, anyway? They don't help. They don't do anything... I + burned it, Ginger. The last letter I shall ever get from him. I made a + bonfire on the bathroom floor, and it smouldered and went brown, and then + flared a little, and every now and then I lit another match and kept it + burning, and at last it was just black ashes and a stain on the tiles. + Just a mess! + </p> + <p> + “Ginger, burn this letter, too. I'm pouring out all the poison to you, + hoping it will make me feel better. You don't mind, do you? But I know you + don't. If ever anybody had a real pal... + </p> + <p> + “It's a dreadful thing, fascination, Ginger. It grips you and you are + helpless. One can be so sensible and reasonable about other people's love + affairs. When I was working at the dance place I told you about there was + a girl who fell in love with the most awful little beast. He had a mean + mouth and shiny black hair brushed straight back, and anybody would have + seen what he was. But this girl wouldn't listen to a word. I talked to her + by the hour. It makes me smile now when I think how sensible and + level-headed I was. But she wouldn't listen. In some mysterious way this + was the man she wanted, and, of course, everything happened that one knew + would happen. + </p> + <p> + “If one could manage one's own life as well as one can manage other + people's! If all this wretched thing of mine had happened to some other + girl, how beautifully I could have proved that it was the best thing that + could have happened, and that a man who could behave as Gerald has done + wasn't worth worrying about. I can just hear myself. But, you see, + whatever he has done, Gerald is still Gerald and Sally is still Sally and, + however much I argue, I can't get away from that. All I can do is to come + howling to my redheaded pal, when I know just as well as he does that a + girl of any spirit would be dignified and keep her troubles to herself and + be much too proud to let anyone know that she was hurt. + </p> + <p> + “Proud! That's the real trouble, Ginger. My pride has been battered and + chopped up and broken into as many pieces as you broke Mr. Scrymgeour's + stick! What pitiful creatures we are. Girls, I mean. At least, I suppose a + good many girls are like me. If Gerald had died and I had lost him that + way, I know quite well I shouldn't be feeling as I do now. I should have + been broken-hearted, but it wouldn't have been the same. It's my pride + that is hurt. I have always been a bossy, cocksure little creature, + swaggering about the world like an English sparrow; and now I'm paying for + it! Oh, Ginger, I'm paying for it! I wonder if running away is going to do + me any good at all. Perhaps, if Mr. Faucitt has some real hard work for me + to do... + </p> + <p> + “Of course, I know exactly how all this has come about. Elsa's pretty and + attractive. But the point is that she is a success, and as a success she + appeals to Gerald's weakest side. He worships success. She is going to + have a marvellous career, and she can help Gerald on in his. He can write + plays for her to star in. What have I to offer against that? Yes, I know + it's grovelling and contemptible of me to say that, Ginger. I ought to be + above it, oughtn't I—talking as if I were competing for some + prize... But I haven't any pride left. Oh, well! + </p> + <p> + “There! I've poured it all out and I really do feel a little better just + for the moment. It won't last, of course, but even a minute is something. + Ginger, dear, I shan't see you for ever so long, even if we ever do meet + again, but you'll try to remember that I'm thinking of you a whole lot, + won't you? I feel responsible for you. You're my baby. You've got started + now and you've only to stick to it. Please, please, please don't 'make a + hash of it'! Good-bye. I never did find that photograph of me that we were + looking for that afternoon in the apartment, or I would send it to you. + Then you could have kept it on your mantelpiece, and whenever you felt + inclined to make a hash of anything I would have caught your eye sternly + and you would have pulled up. + </p> + <p> + “Good-bye, Ginger. I shall have to stop now. The mail is just closing. + </p> + <p> + “Always your pal, wherever I am.—-SALLY.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger laid the letter down, and a little sound escaped him that was half + a sigh, half an oath. He was wondering whether even now some desirable end + might not be achieved by going to Chicago and breaking Gerald Foster's + neck. Abandoning this scheme as impracticable, and not being able to think + of anything else to do he re-lit his pipe and started to read the letter + again. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0012" id="link2HCH0012"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XII. SOME LETTERS FOR GINGER + </h2> + <p> + Laurette et Cie, + </p> + <p> + Regent Street, + </p> + <p> + London, W., + </p> + <p> + England. + </p> + <p> + January 21st. + </p> + <p> + Dear Ginger,—I'm feeling better. As it's three months since I last + wrote to you, no doubt you will say to yourself that I would be a poor, + weak-minded creature if I wasn't. I suppose one ought to be able to get + over anything in three months. Unfortunately, I'm afraid I haven't quite + succeeded in doing that, but at least I have managed to get my troubles + stowed away in the cellar, and I'm not dragging them out and looking at + them all the time. That's something, isn't it? + </p> + <p> + I ought to give you all my impressions of London, I suppose; but I've + grown so used to the place that I don't think I have any now. I seem to + have been here years and years. + </p> + <p> + You will see by the address that Mr. Faucitt has not yet sold his + inheritance. He expects to do so very soon, he tells me—there is a + rich-looking man with whiskers and a keen eye whom he is always lunching + with, and I think big deals are in progress. Poor dear! he is crazy to get + away into the country and settle down and grow ducks and things. London + has disappointed him. It is not the place it used to be. Until quite + lately, when he grew resigned, he used to wander about in a disconsolate + sort of way, trying to locate the landmarks of his youth. (He has not been + in England for nearly thirty years!) The trouble is, it seems, that about + once in every thirty years a sort of craze for change comes over London, + and they paint a shop-front red instead of blue, and that upsets the + returned exile dreadfully. Mr. Faucitt feels like Rip Van Winkle. His + first shock was when he found that the Empire was a theatre now instead of + a music-hall. Then he was told that another music-hall, the Tivoli, had + been pulled down altogether. And when on top of that he went to look at + the baker's shop in Rupert Street, over which he had lodgings in the + eighties, and discovered that it had been turned into a dressmaker's, he + grew very melancholy, and only cheered up a little when a lovely magenta + fog came on and showed him that some things were still going along as in + the good old days. + </p> + <p> + I am kept quite busy at Laurette et Cie., thank goodness. (Not being a + French scholar like you—do you remember Jules?—I thought at + first that Cie was the name of the junior partner, and looked forward to + meeting him. “Miss Nicholas, shake hands with Mr. Cie, one of your + greatest admirers.”) I hold down the female equivalent of your job at the + Fillmore Nicholas Theatrical Enterprises Ltd.—that is to say, I'm a + sort of right-hand woman. I hang around and sidle up to the customers when + they come in, and say, “Chawming weather, moddom!” (which is usually a + black lie) and pass them on to the staff, who do the actual work. I + shouldn't mind going on like this for the next few years, but Mr. Faucitt + is determined to sell. I don't know if you are like that, but every other + Englishman I've ever met seems to have an ambition to own a house and lot + in Loamshire or Hants or Salop or somewhere. Their one object in life is + to make some money and “buy back the old place”—which was sold, of + course, at the end of act one to pay the heir's gambling debts. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Faucitt, when he was a small boy, used to live in a little village in + Gloucestershire, near a place called Cirencester—at least, it isn't: + it's called Cissister, which I bet you didn't know—and after + forgetting about it for fifty years, he has suddenly been bitten by the + desire to end his days there, surrounded by pigs and chickens. He took me + down to see the place the other day. Oh, Ginger, this English country! Why + any of you ever live in towns I can't think. Old, old grey stone houses + with yellow haystacks and lovely squelchy muddy lanes and great fat trees + and blue hills in the distance. The peace of it! If ever I sell my soul, I + shall insist on the devil giving me at least forty years in some English + country place in exchange. + </p> + <p> + Perhaps you will think from all this that I am too much occupied to + remember your existence. Just to show how interested I am in you, let me + tell you that, when I was reading the paper a week ago, I happened to see + the headline, “International Match.” It didn't seem to mean anything at + first, and then I suddenly recollected. This was the thing you had once + been a snip for! So I went down to a place called Twickenham, where this + football game was to be, to see the sort of thing you used to do before I + took charge of you and made you a respectable right-hand man. There was an + enormous crowd there, and I was nearly squeezed to death, but I bore it + for your sake. I found out that the English team were the ones wearing + white shirts, and that the ones in red were the Welsh. I said to the man + next to me, after he had finished yelling himself black in the face, + “Could you kindly inform me which is the English scrum-half?” And just at + that moment the players came quite near where I was, and about a dozen + assassins in red hurled themselves violently on top of a meek-looking + little fellow who had just fallen on the ball. Ginger, you are well out of + it! That was the scrum-half, and I gathered that that sort of thing was a + mere commonplace in his existence. Stopping a rush, it is called, and he + is expected to do it all the time. The idea of you ever going in for such + brutal sports! You thank your stars that you are safe on your little stool + in Fillmore's outer office, and that, if anybody jumps on top of you now, + you can call a cop. Do you mean to say you really used to do these + daredevil feats? You must have hidden depths in you which I have never + suspected. + </p> + <p> + As I was taking a ride down Piccadilly the other day on top of a bus, I + saw somebody walking along who seemed familiar. It was Mr. Carmyle. So + he's back in England again. He didn't see me, thank goodness. I don't want + to meet anybody just at present who reminds me of New York. + </p> + <p> + Thanks for telling me all the news, but please don't do it again. It makes + me remember, and I don't want to. It's this way, Ginger. Let me write to + you, because it really does relieve me, but don't answer my letters. Do + you mind? I'm sure you'll understand. + </p> + <p> + So Fillmore and Gladys Winch are married! From what I have seen of her, + it's the best thing that has ever happened to Brother F. She is a splendid + girl. I must write to him... + </p> + <p> + Laurette et Cie.. + </p> + <p> + London + </p> + <p> + March 12th. + </p> + <p> + Dear Ginger,—I saw in a Sunday paper last week that “The Primrose + Way” had been produced in New York, and was a great success. Well, I'm + very glad. But I don't think the papers ought to print things like that. + It's unsettling. + </p> + <p> + Next day, I did one of those funny things you do when you're feeling blue + and lonely and a long way away from everybody. I called at your club and + asked for you! Such a nice old man in uniform at the desk said in a + fatherly way that you hadn't been in lately, and he rather fancied you + were out of town, but would I take a seat while he inquired. He then + summoned a tiny boy, also in uniform, and the child skipped off chanting, + “Mister Kemp! Mister Kemp!” in a shrill treble. It gave me such an odd + feeling to hear your name echoing in the distance. I felt so ashamed for + giving them all that trouble; and when the boy came back I slipped + twopence into his palm, which I suppose was against all the rules, though + he seemed to like it. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Faucitt has sold the business and retired to the country, and I am + rather at a loose end... + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Monk's Crofton, + (whatever that means) + Much Middleford, + Salop, + (slang for Shropshire) + England. +</pre> + <p> + April 18th. + </p> + <p> + Dear Ginger,—What's the use? What is the use? I do all I can to get + right away from New York, and New York comes after me and tracks me down + in my hiding-place. A week or so ago, as I was walking down the Strand in + an aimless sort of way, out there came right on top of me—who do you + think? Fillmore, arm in arm with Mr. Carmyle! I couldn't dodge. In the + first place, Mr. Carmyle had seen me; in the second place, it is a day's + journey to dodge poor dear Fillmore now. I blushed for him. Ginger! Right + there in the Strand I blushed for him. In my worst dreams I had never + pictured him so enormous. Upon what meat doth this our Fillmore feed that + he is grown so great? Poor Gladys! When she looks at him she must feel + like a bigamist. + </p> + <p> + Apparently Fillmore is still full of big schemes, for he talked airily + about buying all sorts of English plays. He has come over, as I suppose + you know, to arrange about putting on “The Primrose Way” over here. He is + staying at the Savoy, and they took me off there to lunch, whooping + joyfully as over a strayed lamb. It was the worst thing that could + possibly have happened to me. Fillmore talked Broadway without a pause, + till by the time he had worked his way past the French pastry and was + lolling back, breathing a little stertorously, waiting for the coffee and + liqueurs, he had got me so homesick that, if it hadn't been that I didn't + want to make a public exhibition of myself, I should have broken down and + howled. It was crazy of me ever to go near the Savoy. Of course, it's + simply an annex to Broadway. There were Americans at every table as far as + the eye could reach. I might just as well have been at the Astor. + </p> + <p> + Well, if Fate insists in bringing New York to England for my special + discomfiture, I suppose I have got to put up with it. I just let events + take their course, and I have been drifting ever since. Two days ago I + drifted here. Mr. Carmyle invited Fillmore—he seems to love Fillmore—and + me to Monk's Crofton, and I hadn't even the shadow of an excuse for + refusing. So I came, and I am now sitting writing to you in an enormous + bedroom with an open fire and armchairs and every other sort of luxury. + Fillmore is out golfing. He sails for New York on Saturday on the + Mauretania. I am horrified to hear from him that, in addition to all his + other big schemes, he is now promoting a fight for the light-weight + championship in Jersey City, and guaranteeing enormous sums to both + boxers. It's no good arguing with him. If you do, he simply quotes figures + to show the fortunes other people have made out of these things. Besides, + it's too late now, anyway. As far as I can make out, the fight is going to + take place in another week or two. All the same, it makes my flesh creep. + </p> + <p> + Well, it's no use worrying, I suppose. Let's change the subject. Do you + know Monk's Crofton? Probably you don't, as I seem to remember hearing + something said about it being a recent purchase. Mr. Carmyle bought it + from some lord or other who had been losing money on the Stock Exchange. I + hope you haven't seen it, anyway, because I want to describe it at great + length. I want to pour out my soul about it. Ginger, what has England ever + done to deserve such paradises? I thought, in my ignorance, that Mr. + Faucitt's Cissister place was pretty good, but it doesn't even begin. It + can't compete. Of course, his is just an ordinary country house, and this + is a Seat. Monk's Crofton is the sort of place they used to write about in + the English novels. You know. “The sunset was falling on the walls of G—— + Castle, in B——shire, hard by the picturesque village of H——, + and not a stone's throw from the hamlet of J——.” I can imagine + Tennyson's Maud living here. It is one of the stately homes of England; + how beautiful they stand, and I'm crazy about it. + </p> + <p> + You motor up from the station, and after you have gone about three miles, + you turn in at a big iron gate with stone posts on each side with stone + beasts on them. Close by the gate is the cutest little house with an old + man inside it who pops out and touches his hat. This is only the lodge, + really, but you think you have arrived; so you get all ready to jump out, + and then the car goes rolling on for another fifty miles or so through + beech woods full of rabbits and open meadows with deer in them. Finally, + just as you think you are going on for ever, you whizz round a corner, and + there's the house. You don't get a glimpse of it till then, because the + trees are too thick. + </p> + <p> + It's very large, and sort of low and square, with a kind of tower at one + side and the most fascinating upper porch sort of thing with battlements. + I suppose in the old days you used to stand on this and drop molten lead + on visitors' heads. Wonderful lawns all round, and shrubberies and a lake + that you can just see where the ground dips beyond the fields. Of course + it's too early yet for them to be out, but to the left of the house + there's a place where there will be about a million roses when June comes + round, and all along the side of the rose-garden is a high wall of old red + brick which shuts off the kitchen garden. I went exploring there this + morning. It's an enormous place, with hot-houses and things, and there's + the cunningest farm at one end with a stable yard full of puppies that + just tear the heart out of you, they're so sweet. And a big, sleepy cat, + which sits and blinks in the sun and lets the puppies run all over her. + And there's a lovely stillness, and you can hear everything growing. And + thrushes and blackbirds... Oh, Ginger, it's heavenly! + </p> + <p> + But there's a catch. It's a case of “Where every prospect pleases and only + man is vile.” At least, not exactly vile, I suppose, but terribly stodgy. + I can see now why you couldn't hit it off with the Family. Because I've + seen 'em all! They're here! Yes, Uncle Donald and all of them. Is it a + habit of your family to collect in gangs, or have I just happened to + stumble into an accidental Old Home Week? When I came down to dinner the + first evening, the drawing-room was full to bursting point—not + simply because Fillmore was there, but because there were uncles and aunts + all over the place. I felt like a small lion in a den of Daniels. I know + exactly now what you mean about the Family. They look at you! Of course, + it's all right for me, because I am snowy white clear through, but I can + just imagine what it must have been like for you with your permanently + guilty conscience. You must have had an awful time. + </p> + <p> + By the way, it's going to be a delicate business getting this letter + through to you—rather like carrying the despatches through the + enemy's lines in a Civil War play. You're supposed to leave letters on the + table in the hall, and someone collects them in the afternoon and takes + them down to the village on a bicycle. But, if I do that some aunt or + uncle is bound to see it, and I shall be an object of loathing, for it is + no light matter, my lad, to be caught having correspondence with a human + Jimpson weed like you. It would blast me socially. At least, so I gather + from the way they behaved when your name came up at dinner last night. + Somebody mentioned you, and the most awful roasting party broke loose. + Uncle Donald acting as cheer-leader. I said feebly that I had met you and + had found you part human, and there was an awful silence till they all + started at the same time to show me where I was wrong, and how cruelly my + girlish inexperience had deceived me. A young and innocent half-portion + like me, it appears, is absolutely incapable of suspecting the true infamy + of the dregs of society. You aren't fit to speak to the likes of me, being + at the kindest estimate little more than a blot on the human race. I tell + you this in case you may imagine you're popular with the Family. You're + not. + </p> + <p> + So I shall have to exercise a good deal of snaky craft in smuggling this + letter through. I'll take it down to the village myself if I can sneak + away. But it's going to be pretty difficult, because for some reason I + seem to be a centre of attraction. Except when I take refuge in my room, + hardly a moment passes without an aunt or an uncle popping out and having + a cosy talk with me. It sometimes seems as though they were weighing me in + the balance. Well, let 'em weigh! + </p> + <p> + Time to dress for dinner now. Good-bye. + </p> + <p> + Yours in the balance, + </p> + <p> + Sally. + </p> + <p> + P.S.—You were perfectly right about your Uncle Donald's moustache, + but I don't agree with you that it is more his misfortune than his fault. + I think he does it on purpose. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + (Just for the moment) + Monk's Crofton, + Much Middleford, + Salop, + England. +</pre> + <p> + April 20th. + </p> + <p> + Dear Ginger,—Leaving here to-day. In disgrace. Hard, cold looks from + the family. Strained silences. Uncle Donald far from chummy. You can guess + what has happened. I might have seen it coming. I can see now that it was + in the air all along. + </p> + <p> + Fillmore knows nothing about it. He left just before it happened. I shall + see him very soon, for I have decided to come back and stop running away + from things any longer. It's cowardly to skulk about over here. Besides, + I'm feeling so much better that I believe I can face the ghosts. Anyway, + I'm going to try. See you almost as soon as you get this. + </p> + <p> + I shall mail this in London, and I suppose it will come over by the same + boat as me. It's hardly worth writing, really, of course, but I have + sneaked up to my room to wait till the motor arrives to take me to the + station, and it's something to do. I can hear muffled voices. The Family + talking me over, probably. Saying they never really liked me all along. + Oh, well! + </p> + <p> + Yours moving in an orderly manner to the exit, + </p> + <p> + Sally. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0013" id="link2HCH0013"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XIII. STRANGE BEHAVIOUR OF A SPARRING-PARTNER + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + Sally's emotions, as she sat in her apartment on the morning of her return + to New York, resembled somewhat those of a swimmer who, after wavering on + a raw morning at the brink of a chill pool, nerves himself to the plunge. + She was aching, but she knew that she had done well. If she wanted + happiness, she must fight for it, and for all these months she had been + shirking the fight. She had done with wavering on the brink, and here she + was, in mid-stream, ready for whatever might befall. It hurt, this coming + to grips. She had expected it to hurt. But it was a pain that stimulated, + not a dull melancholy that smothered. She felt alive and defiant. + </p> + <p> + She had finished unpacking and tidying up. The next move was certainly to + go and see Ginger. She had suddenly become aware that she wanted very + badly to see Ginger. His stolid friendliness would be a support and a + prop. She wished now that she had sent him a cable, so that he could have + met her at the dock. It had been rather terrible at the dock. The echoing + customs sheds had sapped her valour and she felt alone and forlorn. + </p> + <p> + She looked at her watch, and was surprised to find how early it was. She + could catch him at the office and make him take her out to lunch. She put + on her hat and went out. + </p> + <p> + The restless hand of change, always active in New York, had not spared the + outer office of the Fillmore Nicholas Theatrical Enterprises Ltd. in the + months of her absence. She was greeted on her arrival by an entirely new + and original stripling in the place of the one with whom at her last visit + she had established such cordial relations. Like his predecessor he was + generously pimpled, but there the resemblance stopped. He was a grim boy, + and his manner was stern and suspicious. He peered narrowly at Sally for a + moment as if he had caught her in the act of purloining the office + blotting-paper, then, with no little acerbity, desired her to state her + business. + </p> + <p> + “I want Mr. Kemp,” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + The office-boy scratched his cheek dourly with a ruler. No one would have + guessed, so austere was his aspect, that a moment before her entrance he + had been trying to balance it on his chin, juggling the while with a pair + of paper-weights. For, impervious as he seemed to human weaknesses, it was + this lad's ambition one day to go into vaudeville. + </p> + <p> + “What name?” he said, coldly. + </p> + <p> + “Nicholas,” said Sally. “I am Mr. Nicholas' sister.” + </p> + <p> + On a previous occasion when she had made this announcement, disastrous + results had ensued; but to-day it went well. It seemed to hit the + office-boy like a bullet. He started convulsively, opened his mouth, and + dropped the ruler. In the interval of stooping and recovering it he was + able to pull himself together. He had not been curious about Sally's name. + What he had wished was to have the name of the person for whom she was + asking repeated. He now perceived that he had had a bit of luck. A + wearying period of disappointment in the matter of keeping the + paper-weights circulating while balancing the ruler, had left him peevish, + and it had been his intention to work off his ill-humour on the young + visitor. The discovery that it was the boss's sister who was taking up his + time, suggested the advisability of a radical change of tactics. He had + stooped with a frown: he returned to the perpendicular with a smile that + was positively winning. It was like the sun suddenly bursting through a + London fog. + </p> + <p> + “Will you take a seat, lady?” he said, with polished courtesy even + unbending so far as to reach out and dust one with the sleeve of his coat. + He added that the morning was a fine one. + </p> + <p> + “Thank you,” said Sally. “Will you tell him I'm here.” + </p> + <p> + “Mr. Nicholas is out, miss,” said the office-boy, with gentlemanly regret. + “He's back in New York, but he's gone out.” + </p> + <p> + “I don't want Mr. Nicholas. I want Mr. Kemp.” + </p> + <p> + “Mr. Kemp?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, Mr. Kemp.” + </p> + <p> + Sorrow at his inability to oblige shone from every hill-top on the boy's + face. + </p> + <p> + “Don't know of anyone of that name around here,” he said, apologetically. + </p> + <p> + “But surely...” Sally broke off suddenly. A grim foreboding had come to + her. “How long have you been here?” she asked. + </p> + <p> + “All day, ma'am,” said the office-boy, with the manner of a Casablanca. + </p> + <p> + “I mean, how long have you been employed here?” + </p> + <p> + “Just over a month, miss.” + </p> + <p> + “Hasn't Mr. Kemp been in the office all that time?” + </p> + <p> + “Name's new to me, lady. Does he look like anything? I meanter say, what's + he look like?” + </p> + <p> + “He has very red hair.” + </p> + <p> + “Never seen him in here,” said the office-boy. The truth shone coldly on + Sally. She blamed herself for ever having gone away, and told herself that + she might have known what would happen. Left to his own resources, the + unhappy Ginger had once more made a hash of it. And this hash must have + been a more notable and outstanding hash than any of his previous efforts, + for, surely, Fillmore would not lightly have dismissed one who had come to + him under her special protection. + </p> + <p> + “Where is Mr. Nicholas?” she asked. It seemed to her that Fillmore was the + only possible source of information. “Did you say he was out?” + </p> + <p> + “Really out, miss,” said the office-boy, with engaging candour. “He went + off to White Plains in his automobile half-an-hour ago.” + </p> + <p> + “White Plains? What for?” + </p> + <p> + The pimpled stripling had now given himself up wholeheartedly to social + chit-chat. Usually he liked his time to himself and resented the intrusion + of the outer world, for he who had chosen jugglery for his walk in life + must neglect no opportunity of practising: but so favourable was the + impression which Sally had made on his plastic mind that he was delighted + to converse with her as long as she wished. + </p> + <p> + “I guess what's happened is, he's gone up to take a look at Bugs Butler,” + he said. + </p> + <p> + “Whose butler?” said Sally mystified. + </p> + <p> + The office-boy smiled a tolerant smile. Though an admirer of the sex, he + was aware that women were seldom hep to the really important things in + life. He did not blame them. That was the way they were constructed, and + one simply had to accept it. + </p> + <p> + “Bugs Butler is training up at White Plains, miss.” + </p> + <p> + “Who is Bugs Butler?” + </p> + <p> + Something of his former bleakness of aspect returned to the office-boy. + Sally's question had opened up a subject on which he felt deeply. + </p> + <p> + “Ah!” he replied, losing his air of respectful deference as he approached + the topic. “Who is he! That's what they're all saying, all the wise guys. + Who has Bugs Butler ever licked?” + </p> + <p> + “I don't know,” said Sally, for he had fixed her with a penetrating gaze + and seemed to be pausing for a reply. + </p> + <p> + “Nor nobody else,” said the stripling vehemently. “A lot of stiffs out on + the coast, that's all. Ginks nobody has ever heard of, except Cyclone + Mullins, and it took that false alarm fifteen rounds to get a referee's + decision over him. The boss would go and give him a chance against the + champ, but I could have told him that the legitimate contender was K-leg + Binns. K-leg put Cyclone Mullins out in the fifth. Well,” said the + office-boy in the overwrought tone of one chafing at human folly, “if + anybody thinks Bugs Butler can last six rounds with Lew Lucas, I've two + bucks right here in my vest pocket that says it ain't so.” + </p> + <p> + Sally began to see daylight. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, Bugs—Mr. Butler is one of the boxers in this fight that my + brother is interested in?” + </p> + <p> + “That's right. He's going up against the lightweight champ. Lew Lucas is + the lightweight champ. He's a bird!” + </p> + <p> + “Yes?” said Sally. This youth had a way of looking at her with his head + cocked on one side as though he expected her to say something. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, sir!” said the stripling with emphasis. “Lew Lucas is a hot sketch. + He used to live on the next street to me,” he added as clinching evidence + of his hero's prowess. “I've seen his old mother as close as I am to you. + Say, I seen her a hundred times. Is any stiff of a Bugs Butler going to + lick a fellow like that?” + </p> + <p> + “It doesn't seem likely.” + </p> + <p> + “You spoke it!” said the lad crisply, striking unsuccessfully at a fly + which had settled on the blotting-paper. + </p> + <p> + There was a pause. Sally started to rise. + </p> + <p> + “And there's another thing,” said the office-boy, loath to close the + subject. “Can Bugs Butler make a hundred and thirty-five ringside without + being weak?” + </p> + <p> + “It sounds awfully difficult.” + </p> + <p> + “They say he's clever.” The expert laughed satirically. “Well, what's that + going to get him? The poor fish can't punch a hole in a nut-sundae.” + </p> + <p> + “You don't seem to like Mr. Butler.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I've nothing against him,” said the office-boy magnanimously. “I'm + only saying he's no licence to be mixing it with Lew Lucas.” + </p> + <p> + Sally got up. Absorbing as this chat on current form was, more important + matters claimed her attention. + </p> + <p> + “How shall I find my brother when I get to White Plains?” she asked. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, anybody'll show you the way to the training-camp. If you hurry, + there's a train you can make now.” + </p> + <p> + “Thank you very much.” + </p> + <p> + “You're welcome.” + </p> + <p> + He opened the door for her with an old-world politeness which disuse had + rendered a little rusty: then, with an air of getting back to business + after a pleasant but frivolous interlude, he took up the paper-weights + once more and placed the ruler with nice care on his upturned chin. + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + Fillmore heaved a sigh of relief and began to sidle from the room. It was + a large room, half barn, half gymnasium. Athletic appliances of various + kinds hung on the walls and in the middle there was a wide roped-off + space, around which a small crowd had distributed itself with an air of + expectancy. This is a commercial age, and the days when a prominent + pugilist's training activities used to be hidden from the public gaze are + over. To-day, if the public can lay its hands on fifty cents, it may come + and gaze its fill. This afternoon, plutocrats to the number of about forty + had assembled, though not all of these, to the regret of Mr. Lester + Burrowes, the manager of the eminent Bugs Butler, had parted with solid + coin. Many of those present were newspaper representatives and on the free + list—writers who would polish up Mr. Butler's somewhat crude + prognostications as to what he proposed to do to Mr. Lew Lucas, and would + report him as saying, “I am in really superb condition and feel little + apprehension of the issue,” and artists who would depict him in a state of + semi-nudity with feet several sizes too large for any man. + </p> + <p> + The reason for Fillmore's relief was that Mr. Burrowes, who was a great + talker and had buttonholed him a quarter of an hour ago, had at last had + his attention distracted elsewhere, and had gone off to investigate some + matter that called for his personal handling, leaving Fillmore free to + slide away to the hotel and get a bite to eat, which he sorely needed. The + zeal which had brought him to the training-camp to inspect the final day + of Mr. Butler's preparation—for the fight was to take place on the + morrow—had been so great that he had omitted to lunch before leaving + New York. + </p> + <p> + So Fillmore made thankfully for the door. And it was at the door that he + encountered Sally. He was looking over his shoulder at the moment, and was + not aware of her presence till she spoke. + </p> + <p> + “Hallo, Fillmore!” + </p> + <p> + Sally had spoken softly, but a dynamite explosion could not have shattered + her brother's composure with more completeness. In the leaping twist which + brought him facing her, he rose a clear three inches from the floor. He + had a confused sensation, as though his nervous system had been stirred up + with a pole. He struggled for breath and moistened his lips with the tip + of his tongue, staring at her continuously during the process. + </p> + <p> + Great men, in their moments of weakness, are to be pitied rather than + scorned. If ever a man had an excuse for leaping like a young ram, + Fillmore had it. He had left Sally not much more than a week ago in + England, in Shropshire, at Monk's Crofton. She had said nothing of any + intention on her part of leaving the country, the county, or the house. + Yet here she was, in Bugs Butler's training-camp at White Plains, in the + State of New York, speaking softly in his ear without even going through + the preliminary of tapping him on the shoulder to advertise her presence. + No wonder that Fillmore was startled. And no wonder that, as he adjusted + his faculties to the situation, there crept upon him a chill apprehension. + </p> + <p> + For Fillmore had not been blind to the significance of that invitation to + Monk's Crofton. Nowadays your wooer does not formally approach a girl's + nearest relative and ask permission to pay his addresses; but, when he + invites her and that nearest relative to his country home and collects all + the rest of the family to meet her, the thing may be said to have advanced + beyond the realms of mere speculation. Shrewdly Fillmore had deduced that + Bruce Carmyle was in love with Sally, and mentally he had joined their + hands and given them a brother's blessing. And now it was only too plain + that disaster must have occurred. If the invitation could mean only one + thing, so also could Sally's presence at White Plains mean only one thing. + </p> + <p> + “Sally!” A croaking whisper was the best he could achieve. “What... + what...?” + </p> + <p> + “Did I startle you? I'm sorry.” + </p> + <p> + “What are you doing here? Why aren't you at Monk's Crofton?” + </p> + <p> + Sally glanced past him at the ring and the crowd around it. + </p> + <p> + “I decided I wanted to get back to America. Circumstances arose which made + it pleasanter to leave Monk's Crofton.” + </p> + <p> + “Do you mean to say...?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes. Don't let's talk about it.” + </p> + <p> + “Do you mean to say,” persisted Fillmore, “that Carmyle proposed to you + and you turned him down?” + </p> + <p> + Sally flushed. + </p> + <p> + “I don't think it's particularly nice to talk about that sort of thing, + but—yes.” + </p> + <p> + A feeling of desolation overcame Fillmore. That conviction, which saddens + us at all times, of the wilful bone-headedness of our fellows swept coldly + upon him. Everything had been so perfect, the whole arrangement so ideal, + that it had never occurred to him as a possibility that Sally might take + it into her head to spoil it by declining to play the part allotted to + her. The match was so obviously the best thing that could happen. It was + not merely the suitor's impressive wealth that made him hold this opinion, + though it would be idle to deny that the prospect of having a + brother-in-lawful claim on the Carmyle bank-balance had cast a rosy + glamour over the future as he had envisaged it. He honestly liked and + respected the man. He appreciated his quiet and aristocratic reserve. A + well-bred fellow, sensible withal, just the sort of husband a girl like + Sally needed. And now she had ruined everything. With the capricious + perversity which so characterizes her otherwise delightful sex, she had + spilled the beans. + </p> + <p> + “But why?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, Fill!” Sally had expected that realization of the facts would produce + these symptoms in him, but now that they had presented themselves she was + finding them rasping to the nerves. “I should have thought the reason was + obvious.” + </p> + <p> + “You mean you don't like him?” + </p> + <p> + “I don't know whether I do or not. I certainly don't like him enough to + marry him.” + </p> + <p> + “He's a darned good fellow.” + </p> + <p> + “Is he? You say so. I don't know.” + </p> + <p> + The imperious desire for bodily sustenance began to compete successfully + for Fillmore's notice with his spiritual anguish. + </p> + <p> + “Let's go to the hotel and talk it over. We'll go to the hotel and I'll + give you something to eat.” + </p> + <p> + “I don't want anything to eat, thanks.” + </p> + <p> + “You don't want anything to eat?” said Fillmore incredulously. He supposed + in a vague sort of way that there were eccentric people of this sort, but + it was hard to realize that he had met one of them. “I'm starving.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, run along then.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, but I want to talk...” + </p> + <p> + He was not the only person who wanted to talk. At the moment a small man + of sporting exterior hurried up. He wore what his tailor's advertisements + would have called a “nobbly” suit of checked tweed and—in defiance + of popular prejudice—a brown bowler hat. Mr. Lester Burrowes, having + dealt with the business which had interrupted their conversation a few + minutes before, was anxious to resume his remarks on the subject of the + supreme excellence in every respect of his young charge. + </p> + <p> + “Say, Mr. Nicholas, you ain't going'? Bugs is just getting ready to spar.” + </p> + <p> + He glanced inquiringly at Sally. + </p> + <p> + “My sister—Mr. Burrowes,” said Fillmore faintly. “Mr. Burrowes is + Bugs Butler's manager.” + </p> + <p> + “How do you do?” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + “Pleased to meecher,” said Mr. Burrowes. “Say...” + </p> + <p> + “I was just going to the hotel to get something to eat,” said Fillmore. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Burrowes clutched at his coat-button with a swoop, and held him with a + glittering eye. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, but, say, before-you-go-lemme-tell-ya-somef'n. You've never seen + this boy of mine, not when he was feeling right. Believe me, he's there! + He's a wizard. He's a Hindoo! Say, he's been practising up a left shift + that...” + </p> + <p> + Fillmore's eye met Sally's wanly, and she pitied him. Presently she would + require him to explain to her how he had dared to dismiss Ginger from his + employment—and make that explanation a good one: but in the meantime + she remembered that he was her brother and was suffering. + </p> + <p> + “He's the cleverest lightweight,” proceeded Mr. Burrowes fervently, “since + Joe Gans. I'm telling you and I know! He...” + </p> + <p> + “Can he make a hundred and thirty-five ringside without being weak?” asked + Sally. + </p> + <p> + The effect of this simple question on Mr. Burrowes was stupendous. He + dropped away from Fillmore's coat-button like an exhausted bivalve, and + his small mouth opened feebly. It was as if a child had suddenly + propounded to an eminent mathematician some abstruse problem in the higher + algebra. Females who took an interest in boxing had come into Mr. + Burrowes' life before—-in his younger days, when he was a famous + featherweight, the first of his three wives had been accustomed to sit at + the ringside during his contests and urge him in language of the severest + technicality to knock opponents' blocks off—but somehow he had not + supposed from her appearance and manner that Sally was one of the elect. + He gaped at her, and the relieved Fillmore sidled off like a bird hopping + from the compelling gaze of a snake. He was not quite sure that he was + acting correctly in allowing his sister to roam at large among the + somewhat Bohemian surroundings of a training-camp, but the instinct of + self-preservation turned the scale. He had breakfasted early, and if he + did not eat right speedily it seemed to him that dissolution would set in. + </p> + <p> + “Whazzat?” said Mr. Burrowes feebly. + </p> + <p> + “It took him fifteen rounds to get a referee's decision over Cyclone + Mullins,” said Sally severely, “and K-leg Binns...” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Burrowes rallies. + </p> + <p> + “You ain't got it right” he protested. “Say, you mustn't believe what you + see in the papers. The referee was dead against us, and Cyclone was down + once for all of half a minute and they wouldn't count him out. Gee! You + got to kill a guy in some towns before they'll give you a decision. At + that, they couldn't do nothing so raw as make it anything but a win for my + boy, after him leading by a mile all the way. Have you ever seen Bugs, + ma'am?” + </p> + <p> + Sally had to admit that she had not had that privilege. Mr. Burrowes with + growing excitement felt in his breast-pocket and produced a + picture-postcard, which he thrust into her hand. + </p> + <p> + “That's Bugs,” he said. “Take a slant at that and then tell me if he don't + look the goods.” + </p> + <p> + The photograph represented a young man in the irreducible minimum of + clothing who crouched painfully, as though stricken with one of the acuter + forms of gastritis. + </p> + <p> + “I'll call him over and have him sign it for you,” said Mr. Burrowes, + before Sally had had time to grasp the fact that this work of art was a + gift and no mere loan. “Here, Bugs—wantcher.” + </p> + <p> + A youth enveloped in a bath-robe, who had been talking to a group of + admirers near the ring, turned, started languidly towards them, then, + seeing Sally, quickened his pace. He was an admirer of the sex. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Burrowes did the honours. + </p> + <p> + “Bugs, this is Miss Nicholas, come to see you work out. I have been + telling her she's going to have a treat.” And to Sally. “Shake hands with + Bugs Butler, ma'am, the coming lightweight champion of the world.” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Butler's photograph, Sally considered, had flattered him. He was, in + the flesh, a singularly repellent young man. There was a mean and cruel + curve to his lips and a cold arrogance in his eye; a something dangerous + and sinister in the atmosphere he radiated. Moreover, she did not like the + way he smirked at her. + </p> + <p> + However, she exerted herself to be amiable. + </p> + <p> + “I hope you are going to win, Mr. Butler,” she said. + </p> + <p> + The smile which she forced as she spoke the words removed the coming + champion's doubts, though they had never been serious. He was convinced + now that he had made a hit. He always did, he reflected, with the girls. + It was something about him. His chest swelled complacently beneath the + bath-robe. + </p> + <p> + “You betcher,” he asserted briefly. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Burrows looked at his watch. + </p> + <p> + “Time you were starting, Bugs.” + </p> + <p> + The coming champion removed his gaze from Sally's face, into which he had + been peering in a conquering manner, and cast a disparaging glance at the + audience. It was far from being as large as he could have wished, and at + least a third of it was composed of non-payers from the newspapers. + </p> + <p> + “All right,” he said, bored. + </p> + <p> + His languor left him, as his gaze fell on Sally again, and his spirits + revived somewhat. After all, small though the numbers of spectators might + be, bright eyes would watch and admire him. + </p> + <p> + “I'll go a couple of rounds with Reddy for a starter,” he said. “Seen him + anywheres? He's never around when he's wanted.” + </p> + <p> + “I'll fetch him,” said Mr. Burrowes. “He's back there somewheres.” + </p> + <p> + “I'm going to show that guy up this afternoon,” said Mr. Butler coldly. + “He's been getting too fresh.” + </p> + <p> + The manager bustled off, and Bugs Butler, with a final smirk, left Sally + and dived under the ropes. There was a stir of interest in the audience, + though the newspaper men, blasé through familiarity, exhibited no emotion. + Presently Mr. Burrowes reappeared, shepherding a young man whose face was + hidden by the sweater which he was pulling over his head. He was a + sturdily built young man. The sweater, moving from his body, revealed a + good pair of shoulders. + </p> + <p> + A last tug, and the sweater was off. Red hair flashed into view, tousled + and disordered: and, as she saw it, Sally uttered an involuntary gasp of + astonishment which caused many eyes to turn towards her. And the + red-headed young man, who had been stooping to pick up his gloves, + straightened himself with a jerk and stood staring at her blankly and + incredulously, his face slowly crimsoning. + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + It was the energetic Mr. Burrowes who broke the spell. + </p> + <p> + “Come on, come on,” he said impatiently. “Li'l speed there, Reddy.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger Kemp started like a sleep-walker awakened; then recovering himself, + slowly began to pull on the gloves. Embarrassment was stamped on his + agreeable features. His face matched his hair. + </p> + <p> + Sally plucked at the little manager's elbow. He turned irritably, but + beamed in a distrait sort of manner when he perceived the source of the + interruption. + </p> + <p> + “Who—him?” he said in answer to Sally's whispered question. “He's + just one of Bugs' sparring-partners.” + </p> + <p> + “But...” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Burrowes, fussy now that the time had come for action, interrupted + her. + </p> + <p> + “You'll excuse me, miss, but I have to hold the watch. We mustn't waste + any time.” + </p> + <p> + Sally drew back. She felt like an infidel who intrudes upon the + celebration of strange rites. This was Man's hour, and women must keep in + the background. She had the sensation of being very small and yet very + much in the way, like a puppy who has wandered into a church. The novelty + and solemnity of the scene awed her. + </p> + <p> + She looked at Ginger, who with averted gaze was fiddling with his clothes + in the opposite corner of the ring. He was as removed from communication + as if he had been in another world. She continued to stare, wide-eyed, and + Ginger, shuffling his feet self-consciously, plucked at his gloves. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Butler, meanwhile, having doffed his bath-robe, stretched himself, and + with leisurely nonchalance put on a second pair of gloves, was filling in + the time with a little shadow boxing. He moved rhythmically to and fro, + now ducking his head, now striking out with his muffled hands, and a + sickening realization of the man's animal power swept over Sally and + turned her cold. Swathed in his bath-robe, Bugs Butler had conveyed an + atmosphere of dangerousness: in the boxing-tights which showed up every + rippling muscle, he was horrible and sinister, a machine built for + destruction, a human panther. + </p> + <p> + So he appeared to Sally, but a stout and bulbous eyed man standing at her + side was not equally impressed. Obviously one of the Wise Guys of whom her + friend the sporting office-boy had spoken, he was frankly dissatisfied + with the exhibition. + </p> + <p> + “Shadow-boxing,” he observed in a cavilling spirit to his companion. “Yes, + he can do that all right, just like I can fox-trot if I ain't got a + partner to get in the way. But one good wallop, and then watch him.” + </p> + <p> + His friend, also plainly a guy of established wisdom, assented with a curt + nod. + </p> + <p> + “Ah!” he agreed. + </p> + <p> + “Lew Lucas,” said the first wise guy, “is just as shifty, and he can + punch.” + </p> + <p> + “Ah!” said the second wise guy. + </p> + <p> + “Just because he beats up a few poor mutts of sparring-partners,” said the + first wise guy disparagingly, “he thinks he's someone.” + </p> + <p> + “Ah!” said the second wise guy. + </p> + <p> + As far as Sally could interpret these remarks, the full meaning of which + was shrouded from her, they seemed to be reassuring. For a comforting + moment she ceased to regard Ginger as a martyr waiting to be devoured by a + lion. Mr. Butler, she gathered, was not so formidable as he appeared. But + her relief was not to be long-lived. + </p> + <p> + “Of course he'll eat this red-headed gink,” went on the first wise guy. + “That's the thing he does best, killing his sparring-partners. But Lew + Lucas...” + </p> + <p> + Sally was not interested in Lew Lucas. That numbing fear had come back to + her. Even these cognoscenti, little as they esteemed Mr. Butler, had + plainly no doubts as to what he would do to Ginger. She tried to tear + herself away, but something stronger than her own will kept her there + standing where she was, holding on to the rope and staring forlornly into + the ring. + </p> + <p> + “Ready, Bugs?” asked Mr. Burrowes. + </p> + <p> + The coming champion nodded carelessly. + </p> + <p> + “Go to it,” said Mr. Burrowes. + </p> + <p> + Ginger ceased to pluck at his gloves and advanced into the ring. + </p> + <p> + 4 + </p> + <p> + Of all the learned professions, pugilism is the one in which the trained + expert is most sharply divided from the mere dabbler. In other fields the + amateur may occasionally hope to compete successfully with the man who has + made a business of what is to him but a sport, but at boxing never: and + the whole demeanour of Bugs Butler showed that he had laid this truth to + heart. It would be too little to say that his bearing was confident: he + comported himself with the care-free jauntiness of an infant about to + demolish a Noah's Ark with a tack-hammer. Cyclone Mullinses might + withstand him for fifteen rounds where they yielded to a K-leg Binns in + the fifth, but, when it came to beating up a sparring-partner and an + amateur at that, Bugs Butler knew his potentialities. He was there forty + ways and he did not attempt to conceal it. Crouching as was his wont, he + uncoiled himself like a striking rattlesnake and flicked Ginger lightly + over his guard. Then he returned to his crouch and circled sinuously about + the ring with the amiable intention of showing the crowd, payers and + deadheads alike, what real footwork was. If there was one thing on which + Bugs Butler prided himself, it was footwork. + </p> + <p> + The adverb “lightly” is a relative term, and the blow which had just + planted a dull patch on Ginger's cheekbone affected those present in + different degrees. Ginger himself appeared stolidly callous. Sally + shuddered to the core of her being and had to hold more tightly to the + rope to support herself. The two wise guys mocked openly. To the wise + guys, expert connoisseurs of swat, the thing had appeared richly farcical. + They seemed to consider the blow, administered to a third party and not to + themselves, hardly worth calling a blow at all. Two more, landing as + quickly and neatly as the first, left them equally cold. + </p> + <p> + “Call that punching?” said the first wise guy. + </p> + <p> + “Ah!” said the second wise guy. + </p> + <p> + But Mr. Butler, if he heard this criticism—and it is probable that + he did—for the wise ones had been restrained by no delicacy of + feeling from raising their voices, was in no way discommoded by it. Bugs + Butler knew what he was about. Bright eyes were watching him, and he meant + to give them a treat. The girls like smooth work. Any roughneck could sail + into a guy and knock the daylights out of him, but how few could be clever + and flashy and scientific? Few, few, indeed, thought Mr. Butler as he slid + in and led once more. + </p> + <p> + Something solid smote Mr. Butler's nose, rocking him on to his heels and + inducing an unpleasant smarting sensation about his eyes. He backed away + and regarded Ginger with astonishment, almost with pain. Until this moment + he had scarcely considered him as an active participant in the scene at + all, and he felt strongly that this sort of thing was bad form. It was not + being done by sparring-partners. + </p> + <p> + A juster man might have reflected that he himself was to blame. He had + undeniably been careless. In the very act of leading he had allowed his + eyes to flicker sideways to see how Sally was taking this exhibition of + science, and he had paid the penalty. Nevertheless, he was piqued. He + shimmered about the ring, thinking it over. And the more he thought it + over, the less did he approve of his young assistant's conduct. Hard + thoughts towards Ginger began to float in his mind. + </p> + <p> + Ginger, too, was thinking hard thoughts. He had not had an easy time since + he had come to the training camp, but never till to-day had he experienced + any resentment towards his employer. Until this afternoon Bugs Butler had + pounded him honestly and without malice, and he had gone through it, as + the other sparring-partners did, phlegmatically, taking it as part of the + day's work. But this afternoon there had been a difference. Those careless + flicks had been an insult, a deliberate offence. The man was trying to + make a fool of him, playing to the gallery: and the thought of who was in + that gallery inflamed Ginger past thought of consequences. No one, not + even Mr. Butler, was more keenly alive than he to the fact that in a + serious conflict with a man who to-morrow night might be light-weight + champion of the world he stood no chance whatever: but he did not intend + to be made an exhibition of in front of Sally without doing something to + hold his end up. He proposed to go down with his flag flying, and in + pursuance of this object he dug Mr. Butler heavily in the lower ribs with + his right, causing that expert to clinch and the two wise guys to utter + sharp barking sounds expressive of derision. + </p> + <p> + “Say, what the hell d'ya think you're getting at?” demanded the aggrieved + pugilist in a heated whisper in Ginger's ear as they fell into the + embrace. “What's the idea, you jelly bean?” + </p> + <p> + Ginger maintained a pink silence. His jaw was set, and the temper which + Nature had bestowed upon him to go with his hair had reached white heat. + He dodged a vicious right which whizzed up at his chin out of the breaking + clinch, and rushed. A left hook shook him, but was too high to do more. + There was rough work in the far corner, and suddenly with startling + abruptness Bugs Butler, bothered by the ropes at his back and trying to + side-step, ran into a swing and fell. + </p> + <p> + “Time!” shouted the scandalized Mr. Burrowes, utterly aghast at this + frightful misadventure. In the whole course of his professional experience + he could recall no such devastating occurrence. + </p> + <p> + The audience was no less startled. There was audible gasping. The + newspaper men looked at each other with a wild surmise and conjured up + pleasant pictures of their sporting editors receiving this sensational + item of news later on over the telephone. The two wise guys, continuing to + pursue Mr. Butler with their dislike, emitted loud and raucous laughs, and + one of them, forming his hands into a megaphone, urged the fallen warrior + to go away and get a rep. As for Sally, she was conscious of a sudden, + fierce, cave-womanly rush of happiness which swept away completely the + sickening qualms of the last few minutes. Her teeth were clenched and her + eyes blazed with joyous excitement. She looked at Ginger yearningly, + longing to forget a gentle upbringing and shout congratulation to him. She + was proud of him. And mingled with the pride was a curious feeling that + was almost fear. This was not the mild and amiable young man whom she was + wont to mother through the difficulties of a world in which he was + unfitted to struggle for himself. This was a new Ginger, a stranger to + her. + </p> + <p> + On the rare occasions on which he had been knocked down in the past, it + had been Bugs Butler's canny practice to pause for a while and rest before + rising and continuing the argument, but now he was up almost before he had + touched the boards, and the satire of the second wise guy, who had begun + to saw the air with his hand and count loudly, lost its point. It was only + too plain that Mr. Butler's motto was that a man may be down, but he is + never out. And, indeed, the knock-down had been largely a stumble. Bugs + Butler's educated feet, which had carried him unscathed through so many + contests, had for this single occasion managed to get themselves crossed + just as Ginger's blow landed, and it was to his lack of balance rather + than the force of the swing that his downfall had been due. + </p> + <p> + “Time!” he snarled, casting a malevolent side-glance at his manager. “Like + hell it's time!” + </p> + <p> + And in a whirlwind of flying gloves he flung himself upon Ginger, driving + him across the ring, while Mr. Burrowes, watch in hand, stared with + dropping jaw. If Ginger had seemed a new Ginger to Sally, still more did + this seem a new Bugs Butler to Mr. Burrowes, and the manager groaned in + spirit. Coolness, skill and science—these had been the qualities in + his protégé which had always so endeared him to Mr. Lester Burrowes and + had so enriched their respective bank accounts: and now, on the eve of the + most important fight in his life, before an audience of newspaper men, he + had thrown them all aside and was making an exhibition of himself with a + common sparring-partner. + </p> + <p> + That was the bitter blow to Mr. Burrowes. Had this lapse into the + unscientific primitive happened in a regular fight, he might have mourned + and poured reproof into Bug's ear when he got him back in his corner at + the end of the round; but he would not have experienced this feeling of + helpless horror—the sort of horror an elder of the church might feel + if he saw his favourite bishop yielding in public to the fascination of + jazz. It was the fact that Bugs Butler was lowering himself to extend his + powers against a sparring-partner that shocked Mr. Burrowes. There is an + etiquette in these things. A champion may batter his sparring-partners + into insensibility if he pleases, but he must do it with nonchalance. He + must not appear to be really trying. + </p> + <p> + And nothing could be more manifest than that Bugs Butler was trying. His + whole fighting soul was in his efforts to corner Ginger and destroy him. + The battle was raging across the ring and down the ring, and up the ring + and back again; yet always Ginger, like a storm-driven ship, contrived + somehow to weather the tempest. Out of the flurry of swinging arms he + emerged time after time bruised, bleeding, but fighting hard. + </p> + <p> + For Bugs Butler's fury was defeating its object. Had he remained his cool + and scientific self, he could have demolished Ginger and cut through his + defence in a matter of seconds. But he had lapsed back into the methods of + his unskilled novitiate. He swung and missed, swung and missed again, + struck but found no vital spot. And now there was blood on his face, too. + In some wild mêlée the sacred fount had been tapped, and his teeth gleamed + through a crimson mist. + </p> + <p> + The Wise Guys were beyond speech. They were leaning against one another, + punching each other feebly in the back. One was crying. + </p> + <p> + And then suddenly the end came, as swiftly and unexpectedly as the thing + had begun. His wild swings had tired Bugs Butler, and with fatigue + prudence returned to him. His feet began once more their subtle weaving in + and out. Twice his left hand flickered home. A quick feint, a short, + jolting stab, and Ginger's guard was down and he was swaying in the middle + of the ring, his hands hanging and his knees a-quiver. + </p> + <p> + Bugs Butler measured his distance, and Sally shut her eyes. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0014" id="link2HCH0014"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XIV. MR. ABRAHAMS RE-ENGAGES AN OLD EMPLOYEE + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + The only real happiness, we are told, is to be obtained by bringing + happiness to others. Bugs Butler's mood, accordingly, when some thirty + hours after the painful episode recorded in the last chapter he awoke from + a state of coma in the ring at Jersey City to discover that Mr. Lew Lucas + had knocked him out in the middle of the third round, should have been one + of quiet contentment. His inability to block a short left-hook followed by + a right to the point of the jaw had ameliorated quite a number of + existences. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Lew Lucas, for one, was noticeably pleased. So were Mr. Lucas's + seconds, one of whom went so far as to kiss him. And most of the crowd, + who had betted heavily on the champion, were delighted. Yet Bugs Butler + did not rejoice. It is not too much to say that his peevish bearing struck + a jarring note in the general gaiety. A heavy frown disfigured his face as + he slouched from the ring. + </p> + <p> + But the happiness which he had spread went on spreading. The two Wise + Guys, who had been unable to attend the fight in person, received the + result on the ticker and exuberantly proclaimed themselves the richer by + five hundred dollars. The pimpled office-boy at the Fillmore Nicholas + Theatrical Enterprises Ltd. caused remark in the Subway by whooping + gleefully when he read the news in his morning paper, for he, too, had + been rendered wealthier by the brittleness of Mr. Butler's chin. And it + was with fierce satisfaction that Sally, breakfasting in her little + apartment, informed herself through the sporting page of the details of + the contender's downfall. She was not a girl who disliked many people, but + she had acquired a lively distaste for Bugs Butler. + </p> + <p> + Lew Lucas seemed a man after her own heart. If he had been a personal + friend of Ginger's he could not, considering the brief time at his + disposal, have avenged him with more thoroughness. In round one he had + done all sorts of diverting things to Mr. Butler's left eye: in round two + he had continued the good work on that gentleman's body; and in round + three he had knocked him out. Could anyone have done more? Sally thought + not, and she drank Lew Lucas's health in a cup of coffee and hoped his old + mother was proud of him. + </p> + <p> + The telephone bell rang at her elbow. She unhooked the receiver. + </p> + <p> + “Hullo?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, hullo,” said a voice. + </p> + <p> + “Ginger!” cried Sally delightedly. + </p> + <p> + “I say, I'm awfully glad you're back. I only got your letter this morning. + Found it at the boarding-house. I happened to look in there and...” + </p> + <p> + “Ginger,” interrupted Sally, “your voice is music, but I want to see you. + Where are you?” + </p> + <p> + “I'm at a chemist's shop across the street. I was wondering if...” + </p> + <p> + “Come here at once!” + </p> + <p> + “I say, may I? I was just going to ask.” + </p> + <p> + “You miserable creature, why haven't you been round to see me before?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, as a matter of fact, I haven't been going about much for the last + day. You see...” + </p> + <p> + “I know. Of course.” Quick sympathy came into Sally's voice. She gave a + sidelong glance of approval and gratitude at the large picture of Lew + Lucas which beamed up at her from the morning paper. “You poor thing! How + are you?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, all right, thanks.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, hurry.” + </p> + <p> + There was a slight pause at the other end of the wire. + </p> + <p> + “I say.” + </p> + <p> + “Well?” + </p> + <p> + “I'm not much to look at, you know.” + </p> + <p> + “You never were. Stop talking and hurry over.” + </p> + <p> + “I mean to say...” + </p> + <p> + Sally hung up the receiver firmly. She waited eagerly for some minutes, + and then footsteps came along the passage. They stopped at her door and + the bell rang. Sally ran to the door, flung it open, and recoiled in + consternation. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, Ginger!” + </p> + <p> + He had stated the facts accurately when he had said that he was not much + to look at. He gazed at her devotedly out of an unblemished right eye, but + the other was hidden altogether by a puffy swelling of dull purple. A + great bruise marred his left cheek-bone, and he spoke with some difficulty + through swollen lips. + </p> + <p> + “It's all right, you know,” he assured her. + </p> + <p> + “It isn't. It's awful! Oh, you poor darling!” She clenched her teeth + viciously. “I wish he had killed him!” + </p> + <p> + “Eh?” + </p> + <p> + “I wish Lew Lucas or whatever his name is had murdered him. Brute!” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I don't know, you know.” Ginger's sense of fairness compelled him to + defend his late employer against these harsh sentiments. “He isn't a bad + sort of chap, really. Bugs Butler, I mean.” + </p> + <p> + “Do you seriously mean to stand there and tell me you don't loathe the + creature?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, he's all right. See his point of view and all that. Can't blame him, + if you come to think of it, for getting the wind up a bit in the circs. + Bit thick, I mean to say, a sparring-partner going at him like that. + Naturally he didn't think it much of a wheeze. It was my fault right + along. Oughtn't to have done it, of course, but somehow, when he started + making an ass of me and I knew you were looking on... well, it seemed a + good idea to have a dash at doing something on my own. No right to, of + course. A sparring-partner isn't supposed...” + </p> + <p> + “Sit down,” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + Ginger sat down. + </p> + <p> + “Ginger,” said Sally, “you're too good to live.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I say!” + </p> + <p> + “I believe if someone sandbagged you and stole your watch and chain you'd + say there were faults on both sides or something. I'm just a cat, and I + say I wish your beast of a Bugs Butler had perished miserably. I'd have + gone and danced on his grave... But whatever made you go in for that sort + of thing?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, it seemed the only job that was going at the moment. I've always + done a goodish bit of boxing and I was very fit and so on, and it looked + to me rather an opening. Gave me something to get along with. You get paid + quite fairly decently, you know, and it's rather a jolly life...” + </p> + <p> + “Jolly? Being hammered about like that?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, you don't notice it much. I've always enjoyed scrapping rather. And, + you see, when your brother gave me the push...” + </p> + <p> + Sally uttered an exclamation. + </p> + <p> + “What an extraordinary thing it is—I went all the way out to White + Plains that afternoon to find Fillmore and tackle him about that and I + didn't say a word about it. And I haven't seen or been able to get hold of + him since.” + </p> + <p> + “No? Busy sort of cove, your brother.” + </p> + <p> + “Why did Fillmore let you go?” + </p> + <p> + “Let me go? Oh, you mean... well, there was a sort of mix-up. A kind of + misunderstanding.” + </p> + <p> + “What happened?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, it was nothing. Just a...” + </p> + <p> + “What happened?” + </p> + <p> + Ginger's disfigured countenance betrayed embarrassment. He looked + awkwardly about the room. + </p> + <p> + “It's not worth talking about.” + </p> + <p> + “It is worth talking about. I've a right to know. It was I who sent you to + Fillmore...” + </p> + <p> + “Now that,” said Ginger, “was jolly decent of you.” + </p> + <p> + “Don't interrupt! I sent you to Fillmore, and he had no business to let + you go without saying a word to me. What happened?” + </p> + <p> + Ginger twiddled his fingers unhappily. + </p> + <p> + “Well, it was rather unfortunate. You see, his wife—I don't know if + you know her?...” + </p> + <p> + “Of course I know her.” + </p> + <p> + “Why, yes, you would, wouldn't you? Your brother's wife, I mean,” said + Ginger acutely. “Though, as a matter of fact, you often find + sisters-in-law who won't have anything to do with one another. I know a + fellow...” + </p> + <p> + “Ginger,” said Sally, “it's no good your thinking you can get out of + telling me by rambling off on other subjects. I'm grim and resolute and + relentless, and I mean to get this story out of you if I have to use a + corkscrew. Fillmore's wife, you were saying...” + </p> + <p> + Ginger came back reluctantly to the main theme. + </p> + <p> + “Well, she came into the office one morning, and we started fooling + about...” + </p> + <p> + “Fooling about?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, kind of chivvying each other.” + </p> + <p> + “Chivvying?” + </p> + <p> + “At least I was.” + </p> + <p> + “You were what?” + </p> + <p> + “Sort of chasing her a bit, you know.” + </p> + <p> + Sally regarded this apostle of frivolity with amazement. + </p> + <p> + “What do you mean?” + </p> + <p> + Ginger's embarrassment increased. + </p> + <p> + “The thing was, you see, she happened to trickle in rather quietly when I + happened to be looking at something, and I didn't know she was there till + she suddenly grabbed it...” + </p> + <p> + “Grabbed what?” + </p> + <p> + “The thing. The thing I happened to be looking at. She bagged it... + collared it... took it away from me, you know, and wouldn't give it back + and generally started to rot about a bit, so I rather began to chivvy her + to some extent, and I'd just caught her when your brother happened to roll + in. I suppose,” said Ginger, putting two and two together, “he had really + come with her to the office and had happened to hang back for a minute or + two, to talk to somebody or something... well, of course, he was + considerably fed to see me apparently doing jiu-jitsu with his wife. + Enough to rattle any man, if you come to think of it,” said Ginger, ever + fair-minded. “Well, he didn't say anything at the time, but a bit later in + the day he called me in and administered the push.” + </p> + <p> + Sally shook her head. + </p> + <p> + “It sounds the craziest story to me. What was it that Mrs. Fillmore took + from you?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, just something.” + </p> + <p> + Sally rapped the table imperiously. + </p> + <p> + “Ginger!” + </p> + <p> + “Well, as a matter of fact,” said her goaded visitor, “It was a + photograph.” + </p> + <p> + “Who of? Or, if you're particular, of whom?” + </p> + <p> + “Well... you, to be absolutely accurate.” + </p> + <p> + “Me?” Sally stared. “But I've never given you a photograph of myself.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger's face was a study in scarlet and purple. + </p> + <p> + “You didn't exactly give it to me,” he mumbled. “When I say give, I + mean...” + </p> + <p> + “Good gracious!” Sudden enlightenment came upon Sally. “That photograph we + were hunting for when I first came here! Had you stolen it all the time?” + </p> + <p> + “Why, yes, I did sort of pinch it...” + </p> + <p> + “You fraud! You humbug! And you pretended to help me look for it.” She + gazed at him almost with respect. “I never knew you were so deep and + snaky. I'm discovering all sorts of new things about you.” + </p> + <p> + There was a brief silence. Ginger, confession over, seemed a trifle + happier. + </p> + <p> + “I hope you're not frightfully sick about it?” he said at length. “It was + lying about, you know, and I rather felt I must have it. Hadn't the cheek + to ask you for it, so...” + </p> + <p> + “Don't apologize,” said Sally cordially. “Great compliment. So I have + caused your downfall again, have I? I'm certainly your evil genius, + Ginger. I'm beginning to feel like a regular rag and a bone and a hank of + hair. First I egged you on to insult your family—oh, by the way, I + want to thank you about that. Now that I've met your Uncle Donald I can + see how public-spirited you were. I ruined your prospects there, and now + my fatal beauty—cabinet size—has led to your destruction once + more. It's certainly up to me to find you another job, I can see that.” + </p> + <p> + “No, really, I say, you mustn't bother. I shall be all right.” + </p> + <p> + “It's my duty. Now what is there that you really can do? Burglary, of + course, but it's not respectable. You've tried being a waiter and a + prize-fighter and a right-hand man, and none of those seems to be just + right. Can't you suggest anything?” + </p> + <p> + Ginger shook his head. + </p> + <p> + “I shall wangle something, I expect.”' + </p> + <p> + “Yes, but what? It must be something good this time. I don't want to be + walking along Broadway and come on you suddenly as a street-cleaner. I + don't want to send for an express-man and find you popping up. My idea + would be to go to my bank to arrange an overdraft and be told the + president could give me two minutes and crawl in humbly and find you + prezzing away to beat the band in a big chair. Isn't there anything in the + world that you can do that's solid and substantial and will keep you out + of the poor-house in your old age? Think!” + </p> + <p> + “Of course, if I had a bit of capital...” + </p> + <p> + “Ah! The business man! And what,” inquired Sally, “would you do, Mr. + Morgan, if you had a bit of capital?” + </p> + <p> + “Run a dog-thingummy,” said Ginger promptly. + </p> + <p> + “What's a dog-thingummy?” + </p> + <p> + “Why, a thingamajig. For dogs, you know.” + </p> + <p> + Sally nodded. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, a thingamajig for dogs? Now I understand. You will put things so + obscurely at first. Ginger, you poor fish, what are you raving about? What + on earth is a thingamajig for dogs?” + </p> + <p> + “I mean a sort of place like fellows have. Breeding dogs, you know, and + selling them and winning prizes and all that. There are lots of them + about.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, a kennels?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, a kennels.” + </p> + <p> + “What a weird mind you have, Ginger. You couldn't say kennels at first, + could you? That wouldn't have made it difficult enough. I suppose, if + anyone asked you where you had your lunch, you would say, 'Oh, at a + thingamajig for mutton chops'... Ginger, my lad, there is something in + this. I believe for the first time in our acquaintance you have spoken + something very nearly resembling a mouthful. You're wonderful with dogs, + aren't you?” + </p> + <p> + “I'm dashed keen on them, and I've studied them a bit. As a matter of + fact, though it seems rather like swanking, there isn't much about dogs + that I don't know.” + </p> + <p> + “Of course. I believe you're a sort of honorary dog yourself. I could tell + it by the way you stopped that fight at Roville. You plunged into a + howling mass of about a million hounds of all species and just whispered + in their ears and they stopped at once. Why, the more one examines this, + the better it looks. I do believe it's the one thing you couldn't help + making a success of. It's very paying, isn't it?” + </p> + <p> + “Works out at about a hundred per cent on the original outlay, I've been + told.” + </p> + <p> + “A hundred per cent? That sounds too much like something of Fillmore's for + comfort. Let's say ninety-nine and be conservative. Ginger, you have hit + it. Say no more. You shall be the Dog King, the biggest thingamajigger for + dogs in the country. But how do you start?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, as a matter of fact, while I was up at White Plains, I ran into a + cove who had a place of the sort and wanted to sell out. That was what + made me think of it.” + </p> + <p> + “You must start to-day. Or early to-morrow.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes,” said Ginger doubtfully. “Of course, there's the catch, you know.” + </p> + <p> + “What catch?” + </p> + <p> + “The capital. You've got to have that. This fellow wouldn't sell out under + five thousand dollars.” + </p> + <p> + “I'll lend you five thousand dollars.” + </p> + <p> + “No!” said Ginger. + </p> + <p> + Sally looked at him with exasperation. “Ginger, I'd like to slap you,” she + said. It was maddening, this intrusion of sentiment into business affairs. + Why, simply because he was a man and she was a woman, should she be + restrained from investing money in a sound commercial undertaking? If + Columbus had taken up this bone-headed stand towards Queen Isabella, + America would never have been discovered. + </p> + <p> + “I can't take five thousand dollars off you,” said Ginger firmly. + </p> + <p> + “Who's talking of taking it off me, as you call it?” stormed Sally. “Can't + you forget your burglarious career for a second? This isn't the same thing + as going about stealing defenceless girls' photographs. This is business. + I think you would make an enormous success of a dog-place, and you admit + you're good, so why make frivolous objections? Why shouldn't I put money + into a good thing? Don't you want me to get rich, or what is it?” + </p> + <p> + Ginger was becoming confused. Argument had never been his strong point. + </p> + <p> + “But it's such a lot of money.” + </p> + <p> + “To you, perhaps. Not to me. I'm a plutocrat. Five thousand dollars! + What's five thousand dollars? I feed it to the birds.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger pondered woodenly for a while. His was a literal mind, and he knew + nothing of Sally's finances beyond the fact that when he had first met her + she had come into a legacy of some kind. Moreover, he had been hugely + impressed by Fillmore's magnificence. It seemed plain enough that the + Nicholases were a wealthy family. + </p> + <p> + “I don't like it, you know,” he said. + </p> + <p> + “You don't have to like it,” said Sally. “You just do it.” + </p> + <p> + A consoling thought flashed upon Ginger. + </p> + <p> + “You'd have to let me pay you interest.” + </p> + <p> + “Let you? My lad, you'll have to pay me interest. What do you think this + is—a round game? It's a cold business deal.” + </p> + <p> + “Topping!” said Ginger relieved. “How about twenty-five per cent.” + </p> + <p> + “Don't be silly,” said Sally quickly. “I want three.” + </p> + <p> + “No, that's all rot,” protested Ginger. “I mean to say—three. I + don't,” he went on, making a concession, “mind saying twenty.” + </p> + <p> + “If you insist, I'll make it five. Not more.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, ten, then?” + </p> + <p> + “Five!” + </p> + <p> + “Suppose,” said Ginger insinuatingly, “I said seven?” + </p> + <p> + “I never saw anyone like you for haggling,” said Sally with disapproval. + “Listen! Six. And that's my last word.” + </p> + <p> + “Six?” + </p> + <p> + “Six.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger did sums in his head. + </p> + <p> + “But that would only work out at three hundred dollars a year. It isn't + enough.” + </p> + <p> + “What do you know about it? As if I hadn't been handling this sort of deal + in my life. Six! Do you agree?” + </p> + <p> + “I suppose so.” + </p> + <p> + “Then that's settled. Is this man you talk about in New York?” + </p> + <p> + “No, he's down on Long Island at a place on the south shore.” + </p> + <p> + “I mean, can you get him on the 'phone and clinch the thing?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, yes. I know his address, and I suppose his number's in the book.” + </p> + <p> + “Then go off at once and settle with him before somebody else snaps him + up. Don't waste a minute.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger paused at the door. + </p> + <p> + “I say, you're absolutely sure about this?” + </p> + <p> + “Of course.” + </p> + <p> + “I mean to say...” + </p> + <p> + “Get on,” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + The window of Sally's sitting-room looked out on to a street which, while + not one of the city's important arteries, was capable, nevertheless, of + affording a certain amount of entertainment to the observer: and after + Ginger had left, she carried the morning paper to the window-sill and + proceeded to divide her attention between a third reading of the + fight-report and a lazy survey of the outer world. It was a beautiful day, + and the outer world was looking its best. + </p> + <p> + She had not been at her post for many minutes when a taxi-cab stopped at + the apartment-house, and she was surprised and interested to see her + brother Fillmore heave himself out of the interior. He paid the driver, + and the cab moved off, leaving him on the sidewalk casting a large shadow + in the sunshine. Sally was on the point of calling to him, when his + behaviour became so odd that astonishment checked her. + </p> + <p> + From where she sat Fillmore had all the appearance of a man practising the + steps of a new dance, and sheer curiosity as to what he would do next kept + Sally watching in silence. First, he moved in a resolute sort of way + towards the front door; then, suddenly stopping, scuttled back. This + movement he repeated twice, after which he stood in deep thought before + making another dash for the door, which, like the others, came to an + abrupt end as though he had run into some invisible obstacle. And, + finally, wheeling sharply, he bustled off down the street and was lost to + view. + </p> + <p> + Sally could make nothing of it. If Fillmore had taken the trouble to come + in a taxi-cab, obviously to call upon her, why had he abandoned the idea + at her very threshold? She was still speculating on this mystery when the + telephone-bell rang, and her brother's voice spoke huskily in her ear. + </p> + <p> + “Sally?” + </p> + <p> + “Hullo, Fill. What are you going to call it?” + </p> + <p> + “What am I... Call what?” + </p> + <p> + “The dance you were doing outside here just now. It's your own invention, + isn't it?” + </p> + <p> + “Did you see me?” said Fillmore, upset. + </p> + <p> + “Of course I saw you. I was fascinated.” + </p> + <p> + “I—er—I was coming to have a talk with you. Sally...” + </p> + <p> + Fillmore's voice trailed off. + </p> + <p> + “Well, why didn't you?” + </p> + <p> + There was a pause—on Fillmore's part, if the timbre of at his voice + correctly indicated his feelings, a pause of discomfort. Something was + plainly vexing Fillmore's great mind. + </p> + <p> + “Sally,” he said at last, and coughed hollowly into the receiver. + </p> + <p> + “Yes.” + </p> + <p> + “I—that is to say, I have asked Gladys... Gladys will be coming to + see you very shortly. Will you be in?” + </p> + <p> + “I'll stay in. How is Gladys? I'm longing to see her again.” + </p> + <p> + “She is very well. A trifle—a little upset.” + </p> + <p> + “Upset? What about?” + </p> + <p> + “She will tell you when she arrives. I have just been 'phoning to her. She + is coming at once.” There was another pause. “I'm afraid she has bad + news.” + </p> + <p> + “What news?” + </p> + <p> + There was silence at the other end of the wire. + </p> + <p> + “What news?” repeated Sally, a little sharply. She hated mysteries. + </p> + <p> + But Fillmore had rung off. Sally hung up the receiver thoughtfully. She + was puzzled and anxious. However, there being nothing to be gained by + worrying, she carried the breakfast things into the kitchen and tried to + divert herself by washing up. Presently a ring at the door-bell brought + her out, to find her sister-in-law. + </p> + <p> + Marriage, even though it had brought with it the lofty position of + partnership with the Hope of the American Stage, had effected no + noticeable alteration in the former Miss Winch. As Mrs. Fillmore she was + the same square, friendly creature. She hugged Sally in a muscular manner + and went on in the sitting-room. + </p> + <p> + “Well, it's great seeing you again,” she said. “I began to think you were + never coming back. What was the big idea, springing over to England like + that?” + </p> + <p> + Sally had been expecting the question, and answered it with composure. + </p> + <p> + “I wanted to help Mr. Faucitt.” + </p> + <p> + “Who's Mr. Faucitt?” + </p> + <p> + “Hasn't Fillmore ever mentioned him? He was a dear old man at the + boarding-house, and his brother died and left him a dressmaking + establishment in London. He screamed to me to come and tell him what to do + about it. He has sold it now and is quite happy in the country.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, the trip's done you good,” said Mrs. Fillmore. “You're prettier + than ever.” + </p> + <p> + There was a pause. Already, in these trivial opening exchanges, Sally had + sensed a suggestion of unwonted gravity in her companion. She missed that + careless whimsicality which had been the chief characteristic of Miss + Gladys Winch and seemed to have been cast off by Mrs. Fillmore Nicholas. + At their meeting, before she had spoken, Sally had not noticed this, but + now it was apparent that something was weighing on her companion. Mrs. + Fillmore's honest eyes were troubled. + </p> + <p> + “What's the bad news?” asked Sally abruptly. She wanted to end the + suspense. “Fillmore was telling me over the 'phone that you had some bad + news for me.” + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Fillmore scratched at the carpet for a moment with the end of her + parasol without replying. When she spoke it was not in answer to the + question. + </p> + <p> + “Sally, who's this man Carmyle over in England?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, did Fillmore tell you about him?” + </p> + <p> + “He told me there was a rich fellow over in England who was crazy about + you and had asked you to marry him, and that you had turned him down.” + </p> + <p> + Sally's momentary annoyance faded. She could hardly, she felt, have + expected Fillmore to refrain from mentioning the matter to his wife. + </p> + <p> + “Yes,” she said. “That's true.” + </p> + <p> + “You couldn't write and say you've changed your mind?” + </p> + <p> + Sally's annoyance returned. All her life she had been intensely + independent, resentful of interference with her private concerns. + </p> + <p> + “I suppose I could if I had—but I haven't. Did Fillmore tell you to + try to talk me round?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, I'm not trying to talk you round,” said Mrs. Fillmore quickly. + “Goodness knows, I'm the last person to try and jolly anyone into marrying + anybody if they didn't feel like it. I've seen too many marriages go wrong + to do that. Look at Elsa Doland.” + </p> + <p> + Sally's heart jumped as if an exposed nerve had been touched. + </p> + <p> + “Elsa?” she stammered, and hated herself because her voice shook. “Has—has + her marriage gone wrong?” + </p> + <p> + “Gone all to bits,” said Mrs. Fillmore shortly. “You remember she married + Gerald Foster, the man who wrote 'The Primrose Way'?” + </p> + <p> + Sally with an effort repressed an hysterical laugh. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, I remember,” she said. + </p> + <p> + “Well, it's all gone bloo-ey. I'll tell you about that in a minute. Coming + back to this man in England, if you're in any doubt about it... I mean, + you can't always tell right away whether you're fond of a man or not... + When first I met Fillmore, I couldn't see him with a spy-glass, and now + he's just the whole shooting-match... But that's not what I wanted to talk + about. I was saying one doesn't always know one's own mind at first, and + if this fellow really is a good fellow... and Fillmore tells me he's got + all the money in the world...” + </p> + <p> + Sally stopped her. + </p> + <p> + “No, it's no good. I don't want to marry Mr. Carmyle.” + </p> + <p> + “That's that, then,” said Mrs. Fillmore. “It's a pity, though.” + </p> + <p> + “Why are you taking it so much to heart?” said Sally with a nervous laugh. + </p> + <p> + “Well...” Mrs. Fillmore paused. Sally's anxiety was growing. It must, she + realized, be something very serious indeed that had happened if it had the + power to make her forthright sister-in-law disjointed in her talk. “You + see...” went on Mrs. Fillmore, and stopped again. “Gee! I'm hating this!” + she murmured. + </p> + <p> + “What is it? I don't understand.” + </p> + <p> + “You'll find it's all too darned clear by the time I'm through,” said Mrs. + Fillmore mournfully. “If I'm going to explain this thing, I guess I'd best + start at the beginning. You remember that revue of Fillmore's—the + one we both begged him not to put on. It flopped!” + </p> + <p> + “Oh!” + </p> + <p> + “Yes. It flopped on the road and died there. Never got to New York at all. + Ike Schumann wouldn't let Fillmore have a theatre. The book wanted fixing + and the numbers wanted fixing and the scenery wasn't right: and while they + were tinkering with all that there was trouble about the cast and the + Actors Equity closed the show. Best thing that could have happened, + really, and I was glad at the time, because going on with it would only + have meant wasting more money, and it had cost a fortune already. After + that Fillmore put on a play of Gerald Foster's and that was a frost, too. + It ran a week at the Booth. I hear the new piece he's got in rehearsal now + is no good either. It's called 'The Wild Rose,' or something. But + Fillmore's got nothing to do with that.” + </p> + <p> + “But...” Sally tried to speak, but Mrs. Fillmore went on. + </p> + <p> + “Don't talk just yet, or I shall never get this thing straight. Well, you + know Fillmore, poor darling. Anyone else would have pulled in his horns + and gone slow for a spell, but he's one of those fellows whose horse is + always going to win the next race. The big killing is always just round + the corner with him. Funny how you can see what a chump a man is and yet + love him to death... I remember saying something like that to you + before... He thought he could get it all back by staging this fight of his + that came off in Jersey City last night. And if everything had gone right + he might have got afloat again. But it seems as if he can't touch anything + without it turning to mud. On the very day before the fight was to come + off, the poor mutt who was going against the champion goes and lets a + sparring-partner of his own knock him down and fool around with him. With + all the newspaper men there too! You probably saw about it in the papers. + It made a great story for them. Well, that killed the whole thing. The + public had never been any too sure that this fellow Bugs Butler had a + chance of putting up a scrap with the champion that would be worth paying + to see; and, when they read that he couldn't even stop his + sparring-partners slamming him all around the place they simply decided to + stay away. Poor old Fill! It was a finisher for him. The house wasn't a + quarter full, and after he'd paid these two pluguglies their guarantees, + which they insisted on having before they'd so much as go into the ring, + he was just about cleaned out. So there you are!” + </p> + <p> + Sally had listened with dismay to this catalogue of misfortunes. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, poor Fill!” she cried. “How dreadful!” + </p> + <p> + “Pretty tough.” + </p> + <p> + “But 'The Primrose Way' is a big success, isn't it?” said Sally, anxious + to discover something of brightness in the situation. + </p> + <p> + “It was.” Mrs. Fillmore flushed again. “This is the part I hate having to + tell you.” + </p> + <p> + “It was? Do you mean it isn't still? I thought Elsa had made such a + tremendous hit. I read about it when I was over in London. It was even in + one of the English papers.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, she made a hit all right,” said Mrs. Fillmore drily. “She made such + a hit that all the other managements in New York were after her right + away, and Fillmore had hardly sailed when she handed in her notice and + signed up with Goble and Cohn for a new piece they are starring her in.” + </p> + <p> + “Ah, she couldn't!” cried Sally. + </p> + <p> + “My dear, she did! She's out on the road with it now. I had to break the + news to poor old Fillmore at the dock when he landed. It was rather a + blow. I must say it wasn't what I would call playing the game. I know + there isn't supposed to be any sentiment in business, but after all we had + given Elsa her big chance. But Fillmore wouldn't put her name up over the + theatre in electrics, and Goble and Cohn made it a clause in her contract + that they would, so nothing else mattered. People are like that.” + </p> + <p> + “But Elsa... She used not to be like that.” + </p> + <p> + “They all get that way. They must grab success if it's to be grabbed. I + suppose you can't blame them. You might just as well expect a cat to keep + off catnip. Still, she might have waited to the end of the New York run.” + Mrs. Fillmore put out her hand and touched Sally's. “Well, I've got it out + now,” she said, “and, believe me, it was one rotten job. You don't know + how sorry I am. Sally. I wouldn't have had it happen for a million + dollars. Nor would Fillmore. I'm not sure that I blame him for getting + cold feet and backing out of telling you himself. He just hadn't the nerve + to come and confess that he had fooled away your money. He was hoping all + along that this fight would pan out big and that he'd be able to pay you + back what you had loaned him, but things didn't happen right.” + </p> + <p> + Sally was silent. She was thinking how strange it was that this room in + which she had hoped to be so happy had been from the first moment of her + occupancy a storm centre of bad news and miserable disillusionment. In + this first shock of the tidings, it was the disillusionment that hurt + most. She had always been so fond of Elsa, and Elsa had always seemed so + fond of her. She remembered that letter of Elsa's with all its + protestations of gratitude... It wasn't straight. It was horrible. + Callous, selfish, altogether horrible... + </p> + <p> + “It's...” She choked, as a rush of indignation brought the tears to her + eyes. “It's... beastly! I'm... I'm not thinking about my money. That's + just bad luck. But Elsa...” + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Fillmore shrugged her square shoulders. + </p> + <p> + “Well, it's happening all the time in the show business,” she said. “And + in every other business, too, I guess, if one only knew enough about them + to be able to say. Of course, it hits you hard because Elsa was a pal of + yours, and you're thinking she might have considered you after all you've + done for her. I can't say I'm much surprised myself.” Mrs. Fillmore was + talking rapidly, and dimly Sally understood that she was talking so that + talk would carry her over this bad moment. Silence now would have been + unendurable. “I was in the company with her, and it sometimes seems to me + as if you can't get to know a person right through till you've been in the + same company with them. Elsa's all right, but she's two people really, + like these dual identity cases you read about. She's awfully fond of you. + I know she is. She was always saying so, and it was quite genuine. If it + didn't interfere with business there's nothing she wouldn't do for you. + But when it's a case of her career you don't count. Nobody counts. Not + even her husband. Now that's funny. If you think that sort of thing funny. + Personally, it gives me the willies.” + </p> + <p> + “What's funny?” asked Sally, dully. + </p> + <p> + “Well, you weren't there, so you didn't see it, but I was on the spot all + the time, and I know as well as I know anything that he simply married her + because he thought she could get him on in the game. He hardly paid any + attention to her at all till she was such a riot in Chicago, and then he + was all over her. And now he's got stung. She throws down his show and + goes off to another fellow's. It's like marrying for money and finding the + girl hasn't any. And she's got stung, too, in a way, because I'm pretty + sure she married him mostly because she thought he was going to be the + next big man in the play-writing business and could boost her up the + ladder. And now it doesn't look as though he had another success in him. + The result is they're at outs. I hear he's drinking. Somebody who'd seen + him told me he had gone all to pieces. You haven't seen him, I suppose?” + </p> + <p> + “No.” + </p> + <p> + “I thought maybe you might have run into him. He lives right opposite.” + </p> + <p> + Sally clutched at the arm of her chair. + </p> + <p> + “Lives right opposite? Gerald Foster? What do you mean?” + </p> + <p> + “Across the passage there,” said Mrs. Fillmore, jerking her thumb at the + door. “Didn't you know? That's right, I suppose you didn't. They moved in + after you had beaten it for England. Elsa wanted to be near you, and she + was tickled to death when she found there was an apartment to be had right + across from you. Now, that just proves what I was saying a while ago about + Elsa. If she wasn't fond of you, would she go out of her way to camp next + door? And yet, though she's so fond of you, she doesn't hesitate about + wrecking your property by quitting the show when she sees a chance of + doing herself a bit of good. It's funny, isn't it?” + </p> + <p> + The telephone-bell, tinkling sharply, rescued Sally from the necessity of + a reply. She forced herself across the room to answer it. + </p> + <p> + “Hullo?” + </p> + <p> + Ginger's voice spoke jubilantly. + </p> + <p> + “Hullo. Are you there? I say, it's all right, about that binge, you know.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, yes?” + </p> + <p> + “That dog fellow, you know,” said Ginger, with a slight diminution of + exuberance. His sensitive ear had seemed to detect a lack of animation in + her voice. “I've just been talking to him over the 'phone, and it's all + settled. If,” he added, with a touch of doubt, “you still feel like going + into it, I mean.” + </p> + <p> + There was an instant in which Sally hesitated, but it was only an instant. + </p> + <p> + “Why, of course,” she said, steadily. “Why should you think I had changed + my mind?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, I thought... that is to say, you seemed... oh, I don't know.” + </p> + <p> + “You imagine things. I was a little worried about something when you + called me up, and my mind wasn't working properly. Of course, go ahead + with it. Ginger. I'm delighted.” + </p> + <p> + “I say, I'm awfully sorry you're worried.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh. it's all right.” + </p> + <p> + “Something bad?” + </p> + <p> + “Nothing that'll kill me. I'm young and strong.” + </p> + <p> + Ginger was silent for a moment. + </p> + <p> + “I say, I don't want to butt in, but can I do anything?” + </p> + <p> + “No, really, Ginger, I know you would do anything you could, but this is + just something I must worry through by myself. When do you go down to this + place?” + </p> + <p> + “I was thinking of popping down this afternoon, just to take a look + round.” + </p> + <p> + “Let me know what train you're making and I'll come and see you off.” + </p> + <p> + “That's ripping of you. Right ho. Well, so long.” + </p> + <p> + “So long,” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Fillmore, who had been sitting in that state of suspended animation + which comes upon people who are present at a telephone conversation which + has nothing to do with themselves, came to life as Sally replaced the + receiver. + </p> + <p> + “Sally,” she said, “I think we ought to have a talk now about what you're + going to do.” + </p> + <p> + Sally was not feeling equal to any discussion of the future. All she asked + of the world at the moment was to be left alone. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, that's all right. I shall manage. You ought to be worrying about + Fillmore.” + </p> + <p> + “Fillmore's got me to look after him,” said Gladys, with quiet + determination. “You're the one that's on my mind. I lay awake all last + night thinking about you. As far as I can make out from Fillmore, you've + still a few thousand dollars left. Well, as it happens, I can put you on + to a really good thing. I know a girl...” + </p> + <p> + “I'm afraid,” interrupted Sally, “all the rest of my money, what there is + of it, is tied up.” + </p> + <p> + “You can't get hold of it?” + </p> + <p> + “No.” + </p> + <p> + “But listen,” said Mrs. Fillmore, urgently. “This is a really good thing. + This girl I know started an interior decorating business some time ago and + is pulling in the money in handfuls. But she wants more capital, and she's + willing to let go of a third of the business to anyone who'll put in a few + thousand. She won't have any difficulty getting it, but I 'phoned her this + morning to hold off till I'd heard from you. Honestly, Sally, it's the + chance of a lifetime. It would put you right on easy street. Isn't there + really any way you could get your money out of this other thing and take + on this deal?” + </p> + <p> + “There really isn't. I'm awfully obliged to you, Gladys dear, but it's + impossible.” + </p> + <p> + “Well,” said Mrs. Fillmore, prodding the carpet energetically with her + parasol, “I don't know what you've gone into, but, unless they've given + you a share in the Mint or something, you'll be losing by not making the + switch. You're sure you can't do it?” + </p> + <p> + “I really can't.” + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Fillmore rose, plainly disappointed. + </p> + <p> + “Well, you know best, of course. Gosh! What a muddle everything is. + Sally,” she said, suddenly stopping at the door, “you're not going to hate + poor old Fillmore over this, are you?” + </p> + <p> + “Why, of course not. The whole thing was just bad luck.” + </p> + <p> + “He's worried stiff about it.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, give him my love, and tell him not to be so silly.” + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Fillmore crossed the room and kissed Sally impulsively. + </p> + <p> + “You're an angel,” she said. “I wish there were more like you. But I guess + they've lost the pattern. Well, I'll go back and tell Fillmore that. It'll + relieve him.” + </p> + <p> + The door closed, and Sally sat down with her chin in her hands to think. + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + Mr. Isadore Abrahams, the founder and proprietor of that deservedly + popular dancing resort poetically named “The Flower Garden,” leaned back + in his chair with a contented sigh and laid down the knife and fork with + which he had been assailing a plateful of succulent goulash. He was + dining, as was his admirable custom, in the bosom of his family at his + residence at Far Rockaway. Across the table, his wife, Rebecca, beamed at + him over her comfortable plinth of chins, and round the table his + children, David, Jacob, Morris and Saide, would have beamed at him if they + had not been too busy at the moment ingurgitating goulash. A genial, + honest, domestic man was Mr. Abrahams, a credit to the community. + </p> + <p> + “Mother,” he said. + </p> + <p> + “Pa?” said Mrs. Abrahams. + </p> + <p> + “Knew there was something I'd meant to tell you,” said Mr. Abrahams, + absently chasing a piece of bread round his plate with a stout finger. + “You remember that girl I told you about some time back—girl working + at the Garden—girl called Nicholas, who came into a bit of money and + threw up her job...” + </p> + <p> + “I remember. You liked her. Jakie, dear, don't gobble.” + </p> + <p> + “Ain't gobbling,” said Master Abrahams. + </p> + <p> + “Everybody liked her,” said Mr. Abrahams. “The nicest girl I ever hired, + and I don't hire none but nice girls, because the Garden's a nice place, + and I like to run it nice. I wouldn't give you a nickel for any of your + tough joints where you get nothing but low-lifes and scare away all the + real folks. Everybody liked Sally Nicholas. Always pleasant and always + smiling, and never anything but the lady. It was a treat to have her + around. Well, what do you think?” + </p> + <p> + “Dead?” inquired Mrs. Abrahams, apprehensively. The story had sounded to + her as though it were heading that way. “Wipe your mouth, Jakie dear.” + </p> + <p> + “No, not dead,” said Mr. Abrahams, conscious for the first time that the + remainder of his narrative might be considered by a critic something of an + anti-climax and lacking in drama. “But she was in to see me this afternoon + and wants her job back.” + </p> + <p> + “Ah!” said Mrs. Abrahams, rather tonelessly. An ardent supporter of the + local motion-picture palace, she had hoped for a slightly more gingery + denouement, something with a bit more punch. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, but don't it show you?” continued Mr. Abrahams, gallantly trying to + work up the interest. “There's this girl, goes out of my place not more'n + a year ago, with a good bank-roll in her pocket, and here she is, back + again, all of it spent. Don't it show you what a tragedy life is, if you + see what I mean, and how careful one ought to be about money? It's what I + call a human document. Goodness knows how she's been and gone and spent it + all. I'd never have thought she was the sort of girl to go gadding around. + Always seemed to me to be kind of sensible.” + </p> + <p> + “What's gadding, Pop?” asked Master Jakie, the goulash having ceased to + chain his interest. + </p> + <p> + “Well, she wanted her job back and I gave it to her, and glad to get her + back again. There's class to that girl. She's the sort of girl I want in + the place. Don't seem quite to have so much get-up in her as she used + to... seems kind of quieted down... but she's got class, and I'm glad + she's back. I hope she'll stay. But don't it show you?” + </p> + <p> + “Ah!” said Mrs. Abrahams, with more enthusiasm than before. It had not + worked out such a bad story after all. In its essentials it was not unlike + the film she had seen the previous evening—Gloria Gooch in “A Girl + against the World.” + </p> + <p> + “Pop!” said Master Abrahams. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, Jakie?” + </p> + <p> + “When I'm grown up, I won't never lose no money. I'll put it in the bank + and save it.” + </p> + <p> + The slight depression caused by the contemplation of Sally's troubles left + Mr. Abrahams as mist melts beneath a sunbeam. + </p> + <p> + “That's a good boy, Jakie,” he said. + </p> + <p> + He felt in his waistcoat pocket, found a dime, put it back again, and bent + forward and patted Master Abrahams on the head. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0015" id="link2HCH0015"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XV. UNCLE DONALD SPEAKS HIS MIND + </h2> + <p> + There is in certain men—and Bruce Carmyle was one of them—a + quality of resilience, a sturdy refusal to acknowledge defeat, which aids + them as effectively in affairs of the heart as in encounters of a sterner + and more practical kind. As a wooer, Bruce Carmyle resembled that durable + type of pugilist who can only give of his best after he has received at + least one substantial wallop on some tender spot. Although Sally had + refused his offer of marriage quite definitely at Monk's Crofton, it had + never occurred to him to consider the episode closed. All his life he had + been accustomed to getting what he wanted, and he meant to get it now. + </p> + <p> + He was quite sure that he wanted Sally. There had been moments when he had + been conscious of certain doubts, but in the smart of temporary defeat + these had vanished. That streak of Bohemianism in her which from time to + time since their first meeting had jarred upon his orderly mind was + forgotten; and all that Mr. Carmyle could remember was the brightness of + her eyes, the jaunty lift of her chin, and the gallant trimness of her. + Her gay prettiness seemed to flick at him like a whip in the darkness of + wakeful nights, lashing him to pursuit. And quietly and methodically, like + a respectable wolf settling on the trail of a Red Riding Hood, he prepared + to pursue. Delicacy and imagination might have kept him back, but in these + qualities he had never been strong. One cannot have everything. + </p> + <p> + His preparations for departure, though he did his best to make them + swiftly and secretly, did not escape the notice of the Family. In many + English families there seems to exist a system of inter-communication and + news-distribution like that of those savage tribes in Africa who pass the + latest item of news and interest from point to point over miles of + intervening jungle by some telepathic method never properly explained. On + his last night in London, there entered to Bruce Carmyle at his apartment + in South Audley Street, the Family's chosen representative, the man to + whom the Family pointed with pride—Uncle Donald, in the flesh. + </p> + <p> + There were two hundred and forty pounds of the flesh Uncle Donald was in, + and the chair in which he deposited it creaked beneath its burden. Once, + at Monk's Crofton, Sally had spoiled a whole morning for her brother + Fillmore, by indicating Uncle Donald as the exact image of what he would + be when he grew up. A superstition, cherished from early schooldays, that + he had a weak heart had caused the Family's managing director to abstain + from every form of exercise for nearly fifty years; and, as he combined + with a distaste for exercise one of the three heartiest appetites in the + south-western postal division of London, Uncle Donald, at sixty-two, was + not a man one would willingly have lounging in one's armchairs. Bruce + Carmyle's customary respectfulness was tinged with something approaching + dislike as he looked at him. + </p> + <p> + Uncle Donald's walrus moustache heaved gently upon his laboured breath, + like seaweed on a ground-swell. There had been stairs to climb. + </p> + <p> + “What's this? What's this?” he contrived to ejaculate at last. “You + packing?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes,” said Mr. Carmyle, shortly. For the first time in his life he was + conscious of that sensation of furtive guilt which was habitual with his + cousin Ginger when in the presence of this large, mackerel-eyed man. + </p> + <p> + “You going away?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes.” + </p> + <p> + “Where you going?” + </p> + <p> + “America.” + </p> + <p> + “When you going?” + </p> + <p> + “To-morrow morning.” + </p> + <p> + “Why you going?” + </p> + <p> + This dialogue has been set down as though it had been as brisk and snappy + as any cross-talk between vaudeville comedians, but in reality Uncle + Donald's peculiar methods of conversation had stretched it over a period + of nearly three minutes: for after each reply and before each question he + had puffed and sighed and inhaled his moustache with such painful + deliberation that his companion's nerves were finding it difficult to bear + up under the strain. + </p> + <p> + “You're going after that girl,” said Uncle Donald, accusingly. + </p> + <p> + Bruce Carmyle flushed darkly. And it is interesting to record that at this + moment there flitted through his mind the thought that Ginger's behaviour + at Bleke's Coffee House, on a certain notable occasion, had not been so + utterly inexcusable as he had supposed. There was no doubt that the + Family's Chosen One could be trying. + </p> + <p> + “Will you have a whisky and soda, Uncle Donald?” he said, by way of + changing the conversation. + </p> + <p> + “Yes,” said his relative, in pursuance of a vow he had made in the early + eighties never to refuse an offer of this kind. “Gimme!” + </p> + <p> + You would have thought that that would have put matters on a pleasanter + footing. But no. Having lapped up the restorative, Uncle Donald returned + to the attack quite un-softened. + </p> + <p> + “Never thought you were a fool before,” he said severely. + </p> + <p> + Bruce Carmyle's proud spirit chafed. This sort of interview, which had + become a commonplace with his cousin Ginger, was new to him. Hitherto, his + actions had received neither criticism nor been subjected to it. + </p> + <p> + “I'm not a fool.” + </p> + <p> + “You are a fool. A damn fool,” continued Uncle Donald, specifying more + exactly. “Don't like the girl. Never did. Not a nice girl. Didn't like + her. Right from the first.” + </p> + <p> + “Need we discuss this?” said Bruce Carmyle, dropping, as he was apt to do, + into the grand manner. + </p> + <p> + The Head of the Family drank in a layer of moustache and blew it out + again. + </p> + <p> + “Need we discuss it?” he said with asperity. “We're going to discuss it! + Whatch think I climbed all these blasted stairs for with my weak heart? + Gimme another!” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Carmyle gave him another. + </p> + <p> + “'S a bad business,” moaned Uncle Donald, having gone through the + movements once more. “Shocking bad business. If your poor father were + alive, whatch think he'd say to your tearing across the world after this + girl? I'll tell you what he'd say. He'd say... What kind of whisky's + this?” + </p> + <p> + “O'Rafferty Special.” + </p> + <p> + “New to me. Not bad. Quite good. Sound. Mellow. Wherej get it?” + </p> + <p> + “Bilby's in Oxford Street.” + </p> + <p> + “Must order some. Mellow. He'd say... well, God knows what he'd say. + Whatch doing it for? Whatch doing it for? That's what I can't see. None of + us can see. Puzzles your uncle George. Baffles your aunt Geraldine. Nobody + can understand it. Girl's simply after your money. Anyone can see that.” + </p> + <p> + “Pardon me, Uncle Donald,” said Mr. Carmyle, stiffly, “but that is surely + rather absurd. If that were the case, why should she have refused me at + Monk's Crofton?” + </p> + <p> + “Drawing you on,” said Uncle Donald, promptly. “Luring you on. Well-known + trick. Girl in 1881, when I was at Oxford, tried to lure me on. If I + hadn't had some sense and a weak heart... Whatch know of this girl? Whatch + know of her? That's the point. Who is she? Wherej meet her?” + </p> + <p> + “I met her at Roville, in France.” + </p> + <p> + “Travelling with her family?” + </p> + <p> + “Travelling alone,” said Bruce Carmyle, reluctantly. + </p> + <p> + “Not even with that brother of hers? Bad!” said Uncle Donald. “Bad, bad!” + </p> + <p> + “American girls are accustomed to more independence than English girls.” + </p> + <p> + “That young man,” said Uncle Donald, pursuing a train of thought, “is + going to be fat one of these days, if he doesn't look out. Travelling + alone, was she? What did you do? Catch her eye on the pier?” + </p> + <p> + “Really, Uncle Donald!” + </p> + <p> + “Well, must have got to know her somehow.” + </p> + <p> + “I was introduced to her by Lancelot. She was a friend of his.” + </p> + <p> + “Lancelot!” exploded Uncle Donald, quivering all over like a smitten jelly + at the loathed name. “Well, that shows you what sort of a girl she is. Any + girl that would be a friend of... Unpack!” + </p> + <p> + “I beg your pardon?” + </p> + <p> + “Unpack! Mustn't go on with this foolery. Out of the question. Find some + girl make you a good wife. Your aunt Mary's been meeting some people name + of Bassington-Bassington, related Kent Bassington-Bassingtons... eldest + daughter charming girl, just do for you.” + </p> + <p> + Outside the pages of the more old-fashioned type of fiction nobody ever + really ground his teeth, but Bruce Carmyle came nearer to it at that + moment than anyone had ever come before. He scowled blackly, and the last + trace of suavity left him. + </p> + <p> + “I shall do nothing of the kind,” he said briefly. “I sail to-morrow.” + </p> + <p> + Uncle Donald had had a previous experience of being defied by a nephew, + but it had not accustomed him to the sensation. He was aware of an + unpleasant feeling of impotence. Nothing is harder than to know what to do + next when defied. + </p> + <p> + “Eh?” he said. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Carmyle having started to defy, evidently decided to make a good job + of it. + </p> + <p> + “I am over twenty-one,” said he. “I am financially independent. I shall do + as I please.” + </p> + <p> + “But, consider!” pleaded Uncle Donald, painfully conscious of the weakness + of his words. “Reflect!” + </p> + <p> + “I have reflected.” + </p> + <p> + “Your position in the county...” + </p> + <p> + “I've thought of that.” + </p> + <p> + “You could marry anyone you pleased.” + </p> + <p> + “I'm going to.” + </p> + <p> + “You are determined to go running off to God-knows-where after this Miss + I-can't-even-remember-her-dam-name?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes.” + </p> + <p> + “Have you considered,” said Uncle Donald, portentously, “that you owe a + duty to the Family.” + </p> + <p> + Bruce Carmyle's patience snapped and he sank like a stone to absolutely + Gingerian depths of plain-spokenness. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, damn the Family!” he cried. + </p> + <p> + There was a painful silence, broken only by the relieved sigh of the + armchair as Uncle Donald heaved himself out of it. + </p> + <p> + “After that,” said Uncle Donald, “I have nothing more to say.” + </p> + <p> + “Good!” said Mr. Carmyle rudely, lost to all shame. + </p> + <p> + “'Cept this. If you come back married to that girl, I'll cut you in + Piccadilly. By George, I will!” + </p> + <p> + He moved to the door. Bruce Carmyle looked down his nose without speaking. + A tense moment. + </p> + <p> + “What,” asked Uncle Donald, his fingers on the handle, “did you say it was + called?” + </p> + <p> + “What was what called?” + </p> + <p> + “That whisky.” + </p> + <p> + “O'Rafferty Special.” + </p> + <p> + “And wherj get it?” + </p> + <p> + “Bilby's, in Oxford Street.” + </p> + <p> + “I'll make a note of it,” said Uncle Donald. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0016" id="link2HCH0016"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XVI. AT THE FLOWER GARDEN + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + “And after all I've done for her,” said Mr. Reginald Cracknell, his voice + tremulous with self-pity and his eyes moist with the combined effects of + anguish and over-indulgence in his celebrated private stock, “after all + I've done for her she throws me down.” + </p> + <p> + Sally did not reply. The orchestra of the Flower Garden was of a calibre + that discouraged vocal competition; and she was having, moreover, too much + difficulty in adjusting her feet to Mr. Cracknell's erratic dance-steps to + employ her attention elsewhere. They manoeuvred jerkily past the table + where Miss Mabel Hobson, the Flower Garden's newest “hostess,” sat + watching the revels with a distant hauteur. Miss Hobson was looking her + most regal in old gold and black, and a sorrowful gulp escaped the + stricken Mr. Cracknell as he shambled beneath her eye. + </p> + <p> + “If I told you,” he moaned in Sally's ear, “what... was that your ankle? + Sorry! Don't know what I'm doing to-night... If I told you what I had + spent on that woman, you wouldn't believe it. And then she throws me down. + And all because I said I didn't like her in that hat. She hasn't spoken to + me for a week, and won't answer when I call up on the 'phone. And I was + right, too. It was a rotten hat. Didn't suit her a bit. But that,” said + Mr. Cracknell, morosely, “is a woman all over!” + </p> + <p> + Sally uttered a stifled exclamation as his wandering foot descended on + hers before she could get it out of the way. Mr. Cracknell interpreted the + ejaculation as a protest against the sweeping harshness of his last + remark, and gallantly tried to make amends. + </p> + <p> + “I don't mean you're like that,” he said. “You're different. I could see + that directly I saw you. You have a sympathetic nature. That's why I'm + telling you all this. You're a sensible and broad-minded girl and can + understand. I've done everything for that woman. I got her this job as + hostess here—you wouldn't believe what they pay her. I starred her + in a show once. Did you see those pearls she was wearing? I gave her + those. And she won't speak to me. Just because I didn't like her hat. I + wish you could have seen that hat. You would agree with me, I know, + because you're a sensible, broad-minded girl and understand hats. I don't + know what to do. I come here every night.” Sally was aware of this. She + had seen him often, but this was the first time that Lee Schoenstein, the + gentlemanly master of ceremonies, had inflicted him on her. “I come here + every night and dance past her table, but she won't look at me. What,” + asked Mr. Cracknell, tears welling in his pale eyes, “would you do about + it?” + </p> + <p> + “I don't know,” said Sally, frankly. + </p> + <p> + “Nor do I. I thought you wouldn't, because you're a sensible, + broad-minded... I mean, nor do I. I'm having one last try to-night, if you + can keep a secret. You won't tell anyone, will you?” pleaded Mr. + Cracknell, urgently. “But I know you won't because you're a sensible... + I'm giving her a little present. Having it brought here to-night. Little + present. That ought to soften her, don't you think?” + </p> + <p> + “A big one would do it better.” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Cracknell kicked her on the shin in a dismayed sort of way. + </p> + <p> + “I never thought of that. Perhaps you're right. But it's too late now. + Still, it might. Or wouldn't it? Which do you think?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes,” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + “I thought as much,” said Mr. Cracknell. + </p> + <p> + The orchestra stopped with a thump and a bang, leaving Mr. Cracknell + clapping feebly in the middle of the floor. Sally slipped back to her + table. Her late partner, after an uncertain glance about him, as if he had + mislaid something but could not remember what, zigzagged off in search of + his own seat. The noise of many conversations, drowned by the music, broke + out with renewed vigour. The hot, close air was full of voices; and Sally, + pressing her hands on her closed eyes, was reminded once more that she had + a headache. + </p> + <p> + Nearly a month had passed since her return to Mr. Abrahams' employment. It + had been a dull, leaden month, a monotonous succession of lifeless days + during which life had become a bad dream. In some strange nightmare + fashion, she seemed nowadays to be cut off from her kind. It was weeks + since she had seen a familiar face. None of the companions of her old + boarding-house days had crossed her path. Fillmore, no doubt from + uneasiness of conscience, had not sought her out, and Ginger was working + out his destiny on the south shore of Long Island. + </p> + <p> + She lowered her hands and opened her eyes and looked at the room. It was + crowded, as always. The Flower Garden was one of the many establishments + of the same kind which had swum to popularity on the rising flood of New + York's dancing craze; and doubtless because, as its proprietor had + claimed, it was a nice place and run nice, it had continued, unlike many + of its rivals, to enjoy unvarying prosperity. In its advertisement, it + described itself as “a supper-club for after-theatre dining and dancing,” + adding that “large and spacious, and sumptuously appointed,” it was “one + of the town's wonder-places, with its incomparable dance-floor, enchanting + music, cuisine, and service de luxe.” From which it may be gathered, even + without his personal statements to that effect, that Isadore Abrahams + thought well of the place. + </p> + <p> + There had been a time when Sally had liked it, too. In her first period of + employment there she had found it diverting, stimulating and full of + entertainment. But in those days she had never had headaches or, what was + worse, this dreadful listless depression which weighed her down and made + her nightly work a burden. + </p> + <p> + “Miss Nicholas.” + </p> + <p> + The orchestra, never silent for long at the Flower Garden, had started + again, and Lee Schoenstein, the master of ceremonies, was presenting a new + partner. She got up mechanically. + </p> + <p> + “This is the first time I have been in this place,” said the man, as they + bumped over the crowded floor. He was big and clumsy, of course. To-night + it seemed to Sally that the whole world was big and clumsy. “It's a swell + place. I come from up-state myself. We got nothing like this where I come + from.” He cleared a space before him, using Sally as a battering-ram, and + Sally, though she had not enjoyed her recent excursion with Mr. Cracknell, + now began to look back to it almost with wistfulness. This man was + undoubtedly the worst dancer in America. + </p> + <p> + “Give me li'l old New York,” said the man from up-state, unpatriotically. + “It's good enough for me. I been to some swell shows since I got to town. + You seen this year's 'Follies'?” + </p> + <p> + “No.” + </p> + <p> + “You go,” said the man earnestly. “You go! Take it from me, it's a swell + show. You seen 'Myrtle takes a Turkish Bath'?” + </p> + <p> + “I don't go to many theatres.” + </p> + <p> + “You go! It's a scream. I been to a show every night since I got here. + Every night regular. Swell shows all of 'em, except this last one. I + cert'nly picked a lemon to-night all right. I was taking a chance, y'see, + because it was an opening. Thought it would be something to say, when I + got home, that I'd been to a New York opening. Set me back + two-seventy-five, including tax, and I wish I'd got it in my kick right + now. 'The Wild Rose,' they called it,” he said satirically, as if exposing + a low subterfuge on the part of the management. “'The Wild Rose!' It sure + made me wild all right. Two dollars seventy-five tossed away, just like + that.” + </p> + <p> + Something stirred in Sally's memory. Why did that title seem so familiar? + Then, with a shock, she remembered. It was Gerald's new play. For some + time after her return to New York, she had been haunted by the fear lest, + coming out of her apartment, she might meet him coming out of his; and + then she had seen a paragraph in her morning paper which had relieved her + of this apprehension. Gerald was out on the road with a new play, and “The + Wild Rose,” she was almost sure, was the name of it. + </p> + <p> + “Is that Gerald Foster's play?” she asked quickly. + </p> + <p> + “I don't know who wrote it,” said her partner, “but let me tell you he's + one lucky guy to get away alive. There's fellows breaking stones on the + Ossining Road that's done a lot less to deserve a sentence. Wild Rose! + I'll tell the world it made me go good and wild,” said the man from + up-state, an economical soul who disliked waste and was accustomed to + spread out his humorous efforts so as to give them every chance. “Why, + before the second act was over, the people were beating it for the exits, + and if it hadn't been for someone shouting 'Women and children first' + there'd have been a panic.” + </p> + <p> + Sally found herself back at her table without knowing clearly how she had + got there. + </p> + <p> + “Miss Nicholas.” + </p> + <p> + She started to rise, and was aware suddenly that this was not the voice of + duty calling her once more through the gold teeth of Mr. Schoenstein. The + man who had spoken her name had seated himself beside her, and was talking + in precise, clipped accents, oddly familiar. The mist cleared from her + eyes and she recognized Bruce Carmyle. + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + “I called at your place,” Mr. Carmyle was saying, “and the hall porter + told me that you were here, so I ventured to follow you. I hope you do not + mind? May I smoke?” + </p> + <p> + He lit a cigarette with something of an air. His fingers trembled as he + raised the match, but he flattered himself that there was nothing else in + his demeanour to indicate that he was violently excited. Bruce Carmyle's + ideal was the strong man who can rise superior to his emotions. He was + alive to the fact that this was an embarrassing moment, but he was + determined not to show that he appreciated it. He cast a sideways glance + at Sally, and thought that never, not even in the garden at Monk's Crofton + on a certain momentous occasion, had he seen her looking prettier. Her + face was flushed and her eyes aflame. The stout wraith of Uncle Donald, + which had accompanied Mr. Carmyle on this expedition of his, faded into + nothingness as he gazed. + </p> + <p> + There was a pause. Mr. Carmyle, having lighted his cigarette, puffed + vigorously. + </p> + <p> + “When did you land?” asked Sally, feeling the need of saying something. + Her mind was confused. She could not have said whether she was glad or + sorry that he was there. Glad, she thought, on the whole. There was + something in his dark, cool, stiff English aspect that gave her a curious + feeling of relief. He was so unlike Mr. Cracknell and the man from + up-state and so calmly remote from the feverish atmosphere in which she + lived her nights that it was restful to look at him. + </p> + <p> + “I landed to-night,” said Bruce Carmyle, turning and faced her squarely. + </p> + <p> + “To-night!” + </p> + <p> + “We docked at ten.” + </p> + <p> + He turned away again. He had made his effect, and was content to leave her + to think it over. + </p> + <p> + Sally was silent. The significance of his words had not escaped her. She + realized that his presence there was a challenge which she must answer. + And yet it hardly stirred her. She had been fighting so long, and she felt + utterly inert. She was like a swimmer who can battle no longer and + prepares to yield to the numbness of exhaustion. The heat of the room + pressed down on her like a smothering blanket. Her tired nerves cried out + under the blare of music and the clatter of voices. + </p> + <p> + “Shall we dance this?” he asked. + </p> + <p> + The orchestra had started to play again, a sensuous, creamy melody which + was making the most of its brief reign as Broadway's leading song-hit, + overfamiliar to her from a hundred repetitions. + </p> + <p> + “If you like.” + </p> + <p> + Efficiency was Bruce Carmyle's gospel. He was one of these men who do not + attempt anything which they cannot accomplish to perfection. Dancing, he + had decided early in his life, was a part of a gentleman's education, and + he had seen to it that he was educated thoroughly. Sally, who, as they + swept out on to the floor, had braced herself automatically for a + repetition of the usual bumping struggle which dancing at the Flower + Garden had come to mean for her, found herself in the arms of a masterful + expert, a man who danced better than she did, and suddenly there came to + her a feeling that was almost gratitude, a miraculous slackening of her + taut nerves, a delicious peace. Soothed and contented, she yielded herself + with eyes half closed to the rhythm of the melody, finding it now robbed + in some mysterious manner of all its stale cheapness, and in that moment + her whole attitude towards Bruce Carmyle underwent a complete change. + </p> + <p> + She had never troubled to examine with any minuteness her feelings towards + him: but one thing she had known clearly since their first meeting—that + he was physically distasteful to her. For all his good looks, and in his + rather sinister way he was a handsome man, she had shrunk from him. Now, + spirited away by the magic of the dance, that repugnance had left her. It + was as if some barrier had been broken down between them. + </p> + <p> + “Sally!” + </p> + <p> + She felt his arm tighten about her, the muscles quivering. She caught + sight of his face. His dark eyes suddenly blazed into hers and she + stumbled with an odd feeling of helplessness; realizing with a shock that + brought her with a jerk out of the half-dream into which she had been + lulled that this dance had not postponed the moment of decision, as she + had looked to it to do. In a hot whisper, the words swept away on the + flood of the music which had suddenly become raucous and blaring once + more, he was repeating what he had said under the trees at Monk's Crofton + on that far-off morning in the English springtime. Dizzily she knew that + she was resenting the unfairness of the attack at such a moment, but her + mind seemed numbed. + </p> + <p> + The music stopped abruptly. Insistent clapping started it again, but Sally + moved away to her table, and he followed her like a shadow. Neither spoke. + Bruce Carmyle had said his say, and Sally was sitting staring before her, + trying to think. She was tired, tired. Her eyes were burning. She tried to + force herself to face the situation squarely. Was it worth struggling? Was + anything in the world worth a struggle? She only knew that she was tired, + desperately tired, tired to the very depths of her soul. + </p> + <p> + The music stopped. There was more clapping, but this time the orchestra + did not respond. Gradually the floor emptied. The shuffling of feet + ceased. The Flower Garden was as quiet as it was ever able to be. Even the + voices of the babblers seemed strangely hushed. Sally closed her eyes, and + as she did so from somewhere up near the roof there came the song of a + bird. + </p> + <p> + Isadore Abrahams was a man of his word. He advertised a Flower Garden, and + he had tried to give the public something as closely resembling a + flower-garden as it was possible for an overcrowded, overheated, overnoisy + Broadway dancing-resort to achieve. Paper roses festooned the walls; + genuine tulips bloomed in tubs by every pillar; and from the roof hung + cages with birds in them. One of these, stirred by the sudden cessation of + the tumult below, had began to sing. + </p> + <p> + Sally had often pitied these birds, and more than once had pleaded in vain + with Abrahams for a remission of their sentence, but somehow at this + moment it did not occur to her that this one was merely praying in its own + language, as she often had prayed in her thoughts, to be taken out of this + place. To her, sitting there wrestling with Fate, the song seemed + cheerful. It soothed her. It healed her to listen to it. And suddenly + before her eyes there rose a vision of Monk's Crofton, cool, green, and + peaceful under the mild English sun, luring her as an oasis seen in the + distance lures the desert traveller... + </p> + <p> + She became aware that the master of Monk's Crofton had placed his hand on + hers and was holding it in a tightening grip. She looked down and gave a + little shiver. She had always disliked Bruce Carmyle's hands. They were + strong and bony and black hair grew on the back of them. One of the + earliest feelings regarding him had been that she would hate to have those + hands touching her. But she did not move. Again that vision of the old + garden had flickered across her mind... a haven where she could rest... + </p> + <p> + He was leaning towards her, whispering in her ear. The room was hotter + than it had ever been, noisier than it had ever been, fuller than it had + ever been. The bird on the roof was singing again and now she understood + what it said. “Take me out of this!” Did anything matter except that? What + did it matter how one was taken, or where, or by whom, so that one was + taken. + </p> + <p> + Monk's Crofton was looking cool and green and peaceful... + </p> + <p> + “Very well,” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + Bruce Carmyle, in the capacity of accepted suitor, found himself at + something of a loss. He had a dissatisfied feeling. It was not the manner + of Sally's acceptance that caused this. It would, of course, have pleased + him better if she had shown more warmth, but he was prepared to wait for + warmth. What did trouble him was the fact that his correct mind perceived + now for the first time that he had chosen an unsuitable moment and place + for his outburst of emotion. He belonged to the orthodox school of thought + which looks on moonlight and solitude as the proper setting for a proposal + of marriage; and the surroundings of the Flower Garden, for all its + nice-ness and the nice manner in which it was conducted, jarred upon him + profoundly. + </p> + <p> + Music had begun again, but it was not the soft music such as a lover + demands if he is to give of his best. It was a brassy, clashy rendering of + a ribald one-step, enough to choke the eloquence of the most ardent. + Couples were dipping and swaying and bumping into one another as far as + the eye could reach; while just behind him two waiters had halted in order + to thrash out one of those voluble arguments in which waiters love to + indulge. To continue the scene at the proper emotional level was + impossible, and Bruce Carmyle began his career as an engaged man by + dropping into Smalltalk. + </p> + <p> + “Deuce of a lot of noise,” he said querulously. + </p> + <p> + “Yes,” agreed Sally. + </p> + <p> + “Is it always like this?” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, yes.” + </p> + <p> + “Infernal racket!” + </p> + <p> + “Yes.” + </p> + <p> + The romantic side of Mr. Carmyle's nature could have cried aloud at the + hideous unworthiness of these banalities. In the visions which he had had + of himself as a successful wooer, it had always been in the moments + immediately succeeding the all-important question and its whispered reply + that he had come out particularly strong. He had been accustomed to + picture himself bending with a proud tenderness over his partner in the + scene and murmuring some notably good things to her bowed head. How could + any man murmur in a pandemonium like this. From tenderness Bruce Carmyle + descended with a sharp swoop to irritability. + </p> + <p> + “Do you often come here?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes.” + </p> + <p> + “What for?” + </p> + <p> + “To dance.” + </p> + <p> + Mr. Carmyle chafed helplessly. The scene, which should be so romantic, had + suddenly reminded him of the occasion when, at the age of twenty, he had + attended his first ball and had sat in a corner behind a potted palm + perspiring shyly and endeavouring to make conversation to a formidable + nymph in pink. It was one of the few occasions in his life at which he had + ever been at a complete disadvantage. He could still remember the clammy + discomfort of his too high collar as it melted on him. Most certainly it + was not a scene which he enjoyed recalling; and that he should be forced + to recall it now, at what ought to have been the supreme moment of his + life, annoyed him intensely. Almost angrily he endeavoured to jerk the + conversation to a higher level. + </p> + <p> + “Darling,” he murmured, for by moving his chair two feet to the right and + bending sideways he found that he was in a position to murmur, “you have + made me so...” + </p> + <p> + “Batti, batti! I presto ravioli hollandaise,” cried one of the disputing + waiters at his back—or to Bruce Carmyle's prejudiced hearing it + sounded like that. + </p> + <p> + “La Donna e mobile spaghetti napoli Tettrazina,” rejoined the second + waiter with spirit. + </p> + <p> + “... you have made me so...” + </p> + <p> + “Infanta Isabella lope de Vegas mulligatawny Toronto,” said the first + waiter, weak but coming back pluckily. + </p> + <p> + “... so happy...” + </p> + <p> + “Funiculi funicula Vincente y Blasco Ibanez vermicelli sul campo della + gloria risotto!” said the second waiter clinchingly, and scored a + technical knockout. + </p> + <p> + Bruce Carmyle gave it up, and lit a moody cigarette. He was oppressed by + that feeling which so many of us have felt in our time, that it was all + wrong. + </p> + <p> + The music stopped. The two leading citizens of Little Italy vanished and + went their way, probably to start a vendetta. There followed comparative + calm. But Bruce Carmyle's emotions, like sweet bells jangled, were out of + tune, and he could not recapture the first fine careless rapture. He found + nothing within him but small-talk. + </p> + <p> + “What has become of your party?” he asked. + </p> + <p> + “My party?” + </p> + <p> + “The people you are with,” said Mr. Carmyle. Even in the stress of his + emotion this problem had been exercising him. In his correctly ordered + world girls did not go to restaurants alone. + </p> + <p> + “I'm not with anybody.” + </p> + <p> + “You came here by yourself?” exclaimed Bruce Carmyle, frankly aghast. And, + as he spoke, the wraith of Uncle Donald, banished till now, returned as + large as ever, puffing disapproval through a walrus moustache. + </p> + <p> + “I am employed here,” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Carmyle started violently. + </p> + <p> + “Employed here?” + </p> + <p> + “As a dancer, you know. I...” + </p> + <p> + Sally broke off, her attention abruptly diverted to something which had + just caught her eye at a table on the other side of the room. That + something was a red-headed young man of sturdy build who had just appeared + beside the chair in which Mr. Reginald Cracknell was sitting in huddled + gloom. In one hand he carried a basket, and from this basket, rising above + the din of conversation, there came a sudden sharp yapping. Mr. Cracknell + roused himself from his stupor, took the basket, raised the lid. The + yapping increased in volume. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Cracknell rose, the basket in his arms. With uncertain steps and a + look on his face like that of those who lead forlorn hopes he crossed the + floor to where Miss Mabel Hobson sat, proud and aloof. The next moment + that haughty lady, the centre of an admiring and curious crowd, was + hugging to her bosom a protesting Pekingese puppy, and Mr. Cracknell, + seizing his opportunity like a good general, had deposited himself in a + chair at her side. The course of true love was running smooth again. + </p> + <p> + The red-headed young man was gazing fixedly at Sally. + </p> + <p> + “As a dancer!” ejaculated Mr. Carmyle. Of all those within sight of the + moving drama which had just taken place, he alone had paid no attention to + it. Replete as it was with human interest, sex-appeal, the punch, and all + the other qualities which a drama should possess, it had failed to grip + him. His thoughts had been elsewhere. The accusing figure of Uncle Donald + refused to vanish from his mental eye. The stern voice of Uncle Donald + seemed still to ring in his ear. + </p> + <p> + A dancer! A professional dancer at a Broadway restaurant! Hideous doubts + began to creep like snakes into Bruce Carmyle's mind. What, he asked + himself, did he really know of this girl on whom he had bestowed the + priceless boon of his society for life? How did he know what she was—he + could not find the exact adjective to express his meaning, but he knew + what he meant. Was she worthy of the boon? That was what it amounted to. + All his life he had had a prim shrinking from the section of the feminine + world which is connected with the light-life of large cities. Club + acquaintances of his in London had from time to time married into the + Gaiety Chorus, and Mr. Carmyle, though he had no objection to the Gaiety + Chorus in its proper place—on the other side of the footlights—had + always looked on these young men after as social outcasts. The fine + dashing frenzy which had brought him all the way from South Audley Street + to win Sally was ebbing fast. + </p> + <p> + Sally, hearing him speak, had turned. And there was a candid honesty in + her gaze which for a moment sent all those creeping doubts scuttling away + into the darkness whence they had come. He had not made a fool of himself, + he protested to the lowering phantom of Uncle Donald. Who, he demanded, + could look at Sally and think for an instant that she was not all that was + perfect and lovable? A warm revulsion of feeling swept over Bruce Carmyle + like a returning tide. + </p> + <p> + “You see, I lost my money and had to do something,” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + “I see, I see,” murmured Mr. Carmyle; and if only Fate had left him alone + who knows to what heights of tenderness he might not have soared? But at + this moment Fate, being no respecter of persons, sent into his life the + disturbing personality of George Washington Williams. + </p> + <p> + George Washington Williams was the talented coloured gentleman who had + been extracted from small-time vaudeville by Mr. Abrahams to do a nightly + speciality at the Flower Garden. He was, in fact, a trap-drummer: and it + was his amiable practice, after he had done a few minutes trap-drumming, + to rise from his seat and make a circular tour of the tables on the edge + of the dancing-floor, whimsically pretending to clip the locks of the male + patrons with a pair of drumsticks held scissor-wise. And so it came about + that, just as Mr. Carmyle was bending towards Sally in an access of manly + sentiment, and was on the very verge of pouring out his soul in a series + of well-phrased remarks, he was surprised and annoyed to find an Ethiopian + to whom he had never been introduced leaning over him and taking quite + unpardonable liberties with his back hair. + </p> + <p> + One says that Mr. Carmyle was annoyed. The word is weak. The interruption + coming at such a moment jarred every ganglion in his body. The clicking + noise of the drumsticks maddened him. And the gleaming whiteness of Mr. + Williams' friendly and benignant smile was the last straw. His dignity + writhed beneath this abominable infliction. People at other tables were + laughing. At him. A loathing for the Flower Garden flowed over Bruce + Carmyle, and with it a feeling of suspicion and disapproval of everyone + connected with the establishment. He sprang to his feet. + </p> + <p> + “I think I will be going,” he said. + </p> + <p> + Sally did not reply. She was watching Ginger, who still stood beside the + table recently vacated by Reginald Cracknell. + </p> + <p> + “Good night,” said Mr. Carmyle between his teeth. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, are you going?” said Sally with a start. She felt embarrassed. Try as + she would, she was unable to find words of any intimacy. She tried to + realize that she had promised to marry this man, but never before had he + seemed so much a stranger to her, so little a part of her life. It came to + her with a sensation of the incredible that she had done this thing, taken + this irrevocable step. + </p> + <p> + The sudden sight of Ginger had shaken her. It was as though in the last + half-hour she had forgotten him and only now realized what marriage with + Bruce Carmyle would mean to their comradeship. From now on he was dead to + her. If anything in this world was certain that was. Sally Nicholas was + Ginger's pal, but Mrs. Carmyle, she realized, would never be allowed to + see him again. A devastating feeling of loss smote her like a blow. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, I've had enough of this place,” Bruce Carmyle was saying. + </p> + <p> + “Good night,” said Sally. She hesitated. “When shall I see you?” she asked + awkwardly. + </p> + <p> + It occurred to Bruce Carmyle that he was not showing himself at his best. + He had, he perceived, allowed his nerves to run away with him. + </p> + <p> + “You don't mind if I go?” he said more amiably. “The fact is, I can't + stand this place any longer. I'll tell you one thing, I'm going to take + you out of here quick.” + </p> + <p> + “I'm afraid I can't leave at a moment's notice,” said Sally, loyal to her + obligations. + </p> + <p> + “We'll talk over that to-morrow. I'll call for you in the morning and take + you for a drive somewhere in a car. You want some fresh air after this.” + Mr. Carmyle looked about him in stiff disgust, and expressed his + unalterable sentiments concerning the Flower Garden, that apple of Isadore + Abrahams' eye, in a snort of loathing. “My God! What a place!” + </p> + <p> + He walked quickly away and disappeared. And Ginger, beaming happily, + swooped on Sally's table like a homing pigeon. + </p> + <p> + 4 + </p> + <p> + “Good Lord, I say, what ho!” cried Ginger. “Fancy meeting you here. What a + bit of luck!” He glanced over his shoulder warily. “Has that blighter + pipped?” + </p> + <p> + “Pipped?” + </p> + <p> + “Popped,” explained Ginger. “I mean to say, he isn't coming back or any + rot like that, is he?” + </p> + <p> + “Mr. Carmyle? No, he has gone.” + </p> + <p> + “Sound egg!” said Ginger with satisfaction. “For a moment, when I saw you + yarning away together, I thought he might be with your party. What on + earth is he doing over here at all, confound him? He's got all Europe to + play about in, why should he come infesting New York? I say, it really is + ripping, seeing you again. It seems years... Of course, one get's a + certain amount of satisfaction writing letters, but it's not the same. + Besides, I write such rotten letters. I say, this really is rather + priceless. Can't I get you something? A cup of coffee, I mean, or an egg + or something? By jove! this really is top-hole.” + </p> + <p> + His homely, honest face glowed with pleasure, and it seemed to Sally as + though she had come out of a winter's night into a warm friendly room. Her + mercurial spirits soared. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, Ginger! If you knew what it's like seeing you!” + </p> + <p> + “No, really? Do you mean, honestly, you're braced?” + </p> + <p> + “I should say I am braced.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, isn't that fine! I was afraid you might have forgotten me.” + </p> + <p> + “Forgotten you!” + </p> + <p> + With something of the effect of a revelation it suddenly struck Sally how + far she had been from forgetting him, how large was the place he had + occupied in her thoughts. + </p> + <p> + “I've missed you dreadfully,” she said, and felt the words inadequate as + she uttered them. + </p> + <p> + “What ho!” said Ginger, also internally condemning the poverty of speech + as a vehicle for conveying thought. + </p> + <p> + There was a brief silence. The first exhilaration of the reunion over, + Sally deep down in her heart was aware of a troubled feeling as though the + world were out of joint. She forced herself to ignore it, but it would not + be ignored. It grew. Dimly she was beginning to realize what Ginger meant + to her, and she fought to keep herself from realizing it. Strange things + were happening to her to-night, strange emotions stirring her. Ginger + seemed somehow different, as if she were really seeing him for the first + time. + </p> + <p> + “You're looking wonderfully well,” she said trying to keep the + conversation on a pedestrian level. + </p> + <p> + “I am well,” said Ginger. “Never felt fitter in my life. Been out in the + open all day long... simple life and all that... working like blazes. I + say, business is booming. Did you see me just now, handing over Percy the + Pup to what's-his-name? Five hundred dollars on that one deal. Got the + cheque in my pocket. But what an extraordinarily rummy thing that I should + have come to this place to deliver the goods just when you happened to be + here. I couldn't believe my eyes at first. I say, I hope the people you're + with won't think I'm butting in. You'll have to explain that we're old + pals and that you started me in business and all that sort of thing. Look + here,” he said lowering his voice, “I know how you hate being thanked, but + I simply must say how terrifically decent...” + </p> + <p> + “Miss Nicholas.” + </p> + <p> + Lee Schoenstein was standing at the table, and by his side an expectant + youth with a small moustache and pince-nez. Sally got up, and the next + moment Ginger was alone, gaping perplexedly after her as she vanished and + reappeared in the jogging throng on the dancing floor. It was the nearest + thing Ginger had seen to a conjuring trick, and at that moment he was + ill-attuned to conjuring tricks. He brooded, fuming, at what seemed to him + the supremest exhibition of pure cheek, of monumental nerve, and of + undiluted crust that had ever come within his notice. To come and charge + into a private conversation like that and whisk her away without a word... + </p> + <p> + “Who was that blighter?” he demanded with heat, when the music ceased and + Sally limped back. + </p> + <p> + “That was Mr. Schoenstein.” + </p> + <p> + “And who was the other?” + </p> + <p> + “The one I danced with? I don't know.” + </p> + <p> + “You don't know?” + </p> + <p> + Sally perceived that the conversation had arrived at an embarrassing + point. There was nothing for it but candour. + </p> + <p> + “Ginger,” she said, “you remember my telling you when we first met that I + used to dance in a Broadway place? This is the place. I'm working again.” + </p> + <p> + Complete unintelligence showed itself on Ginger's every feature. + </p> + <p> + “I don't understand,” he said—unnecessarily, for his face revealed + the fact. + </p> + <p> + “I've got my old job back.” + </p> + <p> + “But why?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, I had to do something.” She went on rapidly. Already a light dimly + resembling the light of understanding was beginning to appear in Ginger's + eyes. “Fillmore went smash, you know—it wasn't his fault, poor dear. + He had the worst kind of luck—and most of my money was tied up in + his business, so you see...” + </p> + <p> + She broke off confused by the look in his eyes, conscious of an absurd + feeling of guilt. There was amazement in that look and a sort of + incredulous horror. + </p> + <p> + “Do you mean to say...” Ginger gulped and started again. “Do you mean to + tell me that you let me have... all that money... for the dog-business... + when you were broke? Do you mean to say...” + </p> + <p> + Sally stole a glance at his crimson face and looked away again quickly. + There was an electric silence. + </p> + <p> + “Look here,” exploded Ginger with sudden violence, “you've got to marry + me. You've jolly well got to marry me! I don't mean that,” he added + quickly. “I mean to say I know you're going to marry whoever you please... + but won't you marry me? Sally, for God's sake have a dash at it! I've been + keeping it in all this time because it seemed rather rotten to bother you + about it, but now....Oh, dammit, I wish I could put it into words. I + always was rotten at talking. But... well, look here, what I mean is, I + know I'm not much of a chap, but it seems to me you must care for me a bit + to do a thing like that for a fellow... and... I've loved you like the + dickens ever since I met you... I do wish you'd have a stab at it, Sally. + At least I could look after you, you know, and all that... I mean to say, + work like the deuce and try to give you a good time... I'm not such an ass + as to think a girl like you could ever really... er... love a blighter + like me, but...” + </p> + <p> + Sally laid her hand on his. + </p> + <p> + “Ginger, dear,” she said, “I do love you. I ought to have known it all + along, but I seem to be understanding myself to-night for the first time.” + She got up and bent over him for a swift moment, whispering in his ear, “I + shall never love anyone but you, Ginger. Will you try to remember that.” + She was moving away, but he caught at her arm and stopped her. + </p> + <p> + “Sally...” + </p> + <p> + She pulled her arm away, her face working as she fought against the tears + that would not keep back. + </p> + <p> + “I've made a fool of myself,” she said. “Ginger, your cousin... Mr. + Carmyle... just now he asked me to marry him, and I said I would.” + </p> + <p> + She was gone, flitting among the tables like some wild creature running to + its home: and Ginger, motionless, watched her go. + </p> + <p> + 5 + </p> + <p> + The telephone-bell in Sally's little sitting-room was ringing jerkily as + she let herself in at the front door. She guessed who it was at the other + end of the wire, and the noise of the bell sounded to her like the voice + of a friend in distress crying for help. Without stopping to close the + door, she ran to the table and unhooked the receiver. Muffled, plaintive + sounds were coming over the wire. + </p> + <p> + “Hullo... Hullo... I say... Hullo...” + </p> + <p> + “Hullo, Ginger,” said Sally quietly. + </p> + <p> + An ejaculation that was half a shout and half gurgle answered her. + </p> + <p> + “Sally! Is that you?” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, here I am, Ginger.” + </p> + <p> + “I've been trying to get you for ages.” + </p> + <p> + “I've only just come in. I walked home.” + </p> + <p> + There was a pause. + </p> + <p> + “Hullo.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, I mean...” Ginger seemed to be finding his usual difficulty in + expressing himself. “About that, you know. What you said.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes?” said Sally, trying to keep her voice from shaking. + </p> + <p> + “You said...” Again Ginger's vocabulary failed him. “You said you loved + me.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes,” said Sally simply. + </p> + <p> + Another odd sound floated over the wire, and there was a moment of silence + before Ginger found himself able to resume. + </p> + <p> + “I... I... Well, we can talk about that when we meet. I mean, it's no good + trying to say what I think over the 'phone, I'm sort of knocked out. I + never dreamed... But, I say, what did you mean about Bruce?” + </p> + <p> + “I told you, I told you.” Sally's face was twisted and the receiver shook + in her hand. “I've made a fool of myself. I never realized... And now it's + too late.” + </p> + <p> + “Good God!” Ginger's voice rose in a sharp wail. “You can't mean you + really... You don't seriously intend to marry the man?” + </p> + <p> + “I must. I've promised.” + </p> + <p> + “But, good heavens...” + </p> + <p> + “It's no good. I must.” + </p> + <p> + “But the man's a blighter!” + </p> + <p> + “I can't break my word.” + </p> + <p> + “I never heard such rot,” said Ginger vehemently. “Of course you can. A + girl isn't expected...” + </p> + <p> + “I can't, Ginger dear, I really can't.” + </p> + <p> + “But look here...” + </p> + <p> + “It's really no good talking about it any more, really it isn't... Where + are you staying to-night?” + </p> + <p> + “Staying? Me? At the Plaza. But look here...” + </p> + <p> + Sally found herself laughing weakly. + </p> + <p> + “At the Plaza! Oh, Ginger, you really do want somebody to look after you. + Squandering your pennies like that... Well, don't talk any more now. It's + so late and I'm so tired. I'll come and see you to-morrow. Good night.” + </p> + <p> + She hung up the receiver quickly, to cut short a fresh outburst of + protest. And as she turned away a voice spoke behind her. + </p> + <p> + “Sally!” + </p> + <p> + Gerald Foster was standing in the doorway. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0017" id="link2HCH0017"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XVII. SALLY LAYS A GHOST + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + The blood flowed slowly back into Sally's face, and her heart, which had + leaped madly for an instant at the sound of his voice, resumed its normal + beat. The suddenness of the shock over, she was surprised to find herself + perfectly calm. Always when she had imagined this meeting, knowing that it + would have to take place sooner or later, she had felt something akin to + panic: but now that it had actually occurred it hardly seemed to stir her. + The events of the night had left her incapable of any violent emotion. + </p> + <p> + “Hullo, Sally!” said Gerald. + </p> + <p> + He spoke thickly, and there was a foolish smile on his face as he stood + swaying with one hand on the door. He was in his shirt-sleeves, + collarless: and it was plain that he had been drinking heavily. His face + was white and puffy, and about him there hung like a nimbus a sodden + disreputableness. + </p> + <p> + Sally did not speak. Weighed down before by a numbing exhaustion, she + seemed now to have passed into that second phase in which over-tired + nerves enter upon a sort of Indian summer of abnormal alertness. She + looked at him quietly, coolly and altogether dispassionately, as if he had + been a stranger. + </p> + <p> + “Hullo!” said Gerald again. + </p> + <p> + “What do you want?” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + “Heard your voice. Saw the door open. Thought I'd come in.” + </p> + <p> + “What do you want?” + </p> + <p> + The weak smile which had seemed pinned on Gerald's face vanished. A tear + rolled down his cheek. His intoxication had reached the maudlin stage. + </p> + <p> + “Sally... S-Sally... I'm very miserable.” He slurred awkwardly over the + difficult syllables. “Heard your voice. Saw the door open. Thought I'd + come in.” + </p> + <p> + Something flicked at the back of Sally's mind. She seemed to have been + through all this before. Then she remembered. This was simply Mr. Reginald + Cracknell over again. + </p> + <p> + “I think you had better go to bed, Gerald,” she said steadily. Nothing + about him seemed to touch her now, neither the sight of him nor his + shameless misery. + </p> + <p> + “What's the use? Can't sleep. No good. Couldn't sleep. Sally, you don't + know how worried I am. I see what a fool I've been.” + </p> + <p> + Sally made a quick gesture, to check what she supposed was about to + develop into a belated expression of regret for his treatment of herself. + She did not want to stand there listening to Gerald apologizing with tears + for having done his best to wreck her life. But it seemed that it was not + this that was weighing upon his soul. + </p> + <p> + “I was a fool ever to try writing plays,” he went on. “Got a winner first + time, but can't repeat. It's no good. Ought to have stuck to newspaper + work. I'm good at that. Shall have to go back to it. Had another frost + to-night. No good trying any more. Shall have to go back to the old grind, + damn it.” + </p> + <p> + He wept softly, full of pity for his hard case. + </p> + <p> + “Very miserable,” he murmured. + </p> + <p> + He came forward a step into the room, lurched, and retreated to the safe + support of the door. For an instant Sally's artificial calm was shot + through by a swift stab of contempt. It passed, and she was back again in + her armour of indifference. + </p> + <p> + “Go to bed, Gerald,” she said. “You'll feel better in the morning.” + </p> + <p> + Perhaps some inkling of how he was going to feel in the morning worked + through to Gerald's muddled intelligence, for he winced, and his manner + took on a deeper melancholy. + </p> + <p> + “May not be alive in the morning,” he said solemnly. “Good mind to end it + all. End it all!” he repeated with the beginning of a sweeping gesture + which was cut off abruptly as he clutched at the friendly door. + </p> + <p> + Sally was not in the mood for melodrama. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, go to bed,” she said impatiently. The strange frozen indifference + which had gripped her was beginning to pass, leaving in its place a + growing feeling of resentment—resentment against Gerald for + degrading himself like this, against herself for ever having found glamour + in the man. It humiliated her to remember how utterly she had once allowed + his personality to master hers. And under the sting of this humiliation + she felt hard and pitiless. Dimly she was aware that a curious change had + come over her to-night. Normally, the sight of any living thing in + distress was enough to stir her quick sympathy: but Gerald mourning over + the prospect of having to go back to regular work made no appeal to her—a + fact which the sufferer noted and commented upon. + </p> + <p> + “You're very unsymp... unsympathetic,” he complained. + </p> + <p> + “I'm sorry,” said Sally. She walked briskly to the door and gave it a + push. Gerald, still clinging to his chosen support, moved out into the + passage, attached to the handle, with the air of a man the foundations of + whose world have suddenly lost their stability. He released the handle and + moved uncertainly across the passage. Finding his own door open before + him, he staggered over the threshold; and Sally, having watched him safely + to his journey's end, went into her bedroom with the intention of + terminating this disturbing night by going to sleep. + </p> + <p> + Almost immediately she changed her mind. Sleep was out of the question. A + fever of restlessness had come upon her. She put on a kimono, and went + into the kitchen to ascertain whether her commissariat arrangements would + permit of a glass of hot milk. + </p> + <p> + She had just remembered that she had that morning presented the last of + the milk to a sandy cat with a purposeful eye which had dropped in through + the window to take breakfast with her, when her regrets for this + thriftless hospitality were interrupted by a muffled crash. + </p> + <p> + She listened intently. The sound had seemed to come from across the + passage. She hurried to the door and opened it. As she did so, from behind + the door of the apartment opposite there came a perfect fusillade of + crashes, each seeming to her strained hearing louder and more appalling + than the last. + </p> + <p> + There is something about sudden, loud noises in the stillness of the night + which shatters the most rigid detachment. A short while before, Gerald, + toying with the idea of ending his sorrows by violence, had left Sally + unmoved: but now her mind leapt back to what he had said, and apprehension + succeeded indifference. There was no disputing the fact that Gerald was in + an irresponsible mood, under the influence of which he was capable of + doing almost anything. Sally, listening in the doorway, felt a momentary + panic. + </p> + <p> + A brief silence had succeeded the fusillade, but, as she stood there + hesitating, the noise broke out again; and this time it was so loud and + compelling that Sally hesitated no longer. She ran across the passage and + beat on the door. + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + Whatever devastating happenings had been going on in his home, it was + plain a moment later that Gerald had managed to survive them: for there + came the sound of a dragging footstep, and the door opened. Gerald stood + on the threshold, the weak smile back on his face. + </p> + <p> + “Hullo, Sally!” + </p> + <p> + At the sight of him, disreputable and obviously unscathed, Sally's brief + alarm died away, leaving in its place the old feeling of impatient + resentment. In addition to her other grievances against him, he had + apparently frightened her unnecessarily. + </p> + <p> + “Whatever was all that noise?” she demanded. + </p> + <p> + “Noise?” said Gerald, considering the point open-mouthed. + </p> + <p> + “Yes, noise,” snapped Sally. + </p> + <p> + “I've been cleaning house,” said Gerald with the owl-like gravity of a man + just conscious that he is not wholly himself. + </p> + <p> + Sally pushed her way past him. The apartment in which she found herself + was almost an exact replica of her own, and it was evident that Elsa + Doland had taken pains to make it pretty and comfortable in a niggly + feminine way. Amateur interior decoration had always been a hobby of hers. + Even in the unpromising surroundings of her bedroom at Mrs. Meecher's + boarding-house she had contrived to create a certain daintiness which + Sally, who had no ability in that direction herself, had always rather + envied. As a decorator Elsa's mind ran in the direction of small, fragile + ornaments, and she was not afraid of over-furnishing. Pictures jostled one + another on the walls: china of all description stood about on little + tables: there was a profusion of lamps with shades of parti-coloured + glass: and plates were ranged along a series of shelves. + </p> + <p> + One says that the plates were ranged and the pictures jostled one another, + but it would be more correct to put it they had jostled and had been + ranged, for it was only by guess-work that Sally was able to reconstruct + the scene as it must have appeared before Gerald had started, as he put + it, to clean house. She had walked into the flat briskly enough, but she + pulled up short as she crossed the threshold, appalled by the majestic + ruin that met her gaze. A shell bursting in the little sitting-room could + hardly have created more havoc. + </p> + <p> + The psychology of a man of weak character under the influence of alcohol + and disappointed ambition is not easy to plumb, for his moods follow one + another with a rapidity which baffles the observer. Ten minutes before, + Gerald Foster had been in the grip of a clammy self-pity, and it seemed + from his aspect at the present moment that this phase had returned. But in + the interval there had manifestly occurred a brief but adequate spasm of + what would appear to have been an almost Berserk fury. What had caused it + and why it should have expended itself so abruptly, Sally was not + psychologist enough to explain; but that it had existed there was ocular + evidence of the most convincing kind. A heavy niblick, flung petulantly—or + remorsefully—into a corner, showed by what medium the destruction + had been accomplished. + </p> + <p> + Bleak chaos appeared on every side. The floor was littered with every + imaginable shape and size of broken glass and china. Fragments of + pictures, looking as if they had been chewed by some prehistoric animal, + lay amid heaps of shattered statuettes and vases. As Sally moved slowly + into the room after her involuntary pause, china crackled beneath her + feet. She surveyed the stripped walls with a wondering eye, and turned to + Gerald for an explanation. + </p> + <p> + Gerald had subsided on to an occasional table, and was weeping softly + again. It had come over him once more that he had been very, very badly + treated. + </p> + <p> + “Well!” said Sally with a gasp. “You've certainly made a good job of it!” + </p> + <p> + There was a sharp crack as the occasional table, never designed by its + maker to bear heavy weights, gave way in a splintering flurry of broken + legs under the pressure of the master of the house: and Sally's mood + underwent an abrupt change. There are few situations in life which do not + hold equal potentialities for both tragedy and farce, and it was the + ludicrous side of this drama that chanced to appeal to Sally at this + moment. Her sense of humour was tickled. It was, if she could have + analysed her feelings, at herself that she was mocking—at the feeble + sentimental Sally who had once conceived the absurd idea of taking this + preposterous man seriously. She felt light-hearted and light-headed, and + she sank into a chair with a gurgling laugh. + </p> + <p> + The shock of his fall appeared to have had the desirable effect of + restoring Gerald to something approaching intelligence. He picked himself + up from the remains of a set of water-colours, gazing at Sally with + growing disapproval. + </p> + <p> + “No sympathy,” he said austerely. + </p> + <p> + “I can't help it,” cried Sally. “It's too funny.” + </p> + <p> + “Not funny,” corrected Gerald, his brain beginning to cloud once more. + </p> + <p> + “What did you do it for?” + </p> + <p> + Gerald returned for a moment to that mood of honest indignation, which had + so strengthened his arm when wielding the niblick. He bethought him once + again of his grievance. + </p> + <p> + “Wasn't going to stand for it any longer,” he said heatedly. “A fellow's + wife goes and lets him down... ruins his show by going off and playing in + another show... why shouldn't I smash her things? Why should I stand for + that sort of treatment? Why should I?” + </p> + <p> + “Well, you haven't,” said Sally, “so there's no need to discuss it. You + seem to have acted in a thoroughly manly and independent way.” + </p> + <p> + “That's it. Manly independent.” He waggled his finger impressively. “Don't + care what she says,” he continued. “Don't care if she never comes back. + That woman...” + </p> + <p> + Sally was not prepared to embark with him upon a discussion of the absent + Elsa. Already the amusing aspect of the affair had begun to fade, and her + hilarity was giving way to a tired distaste for the sordidness of the + whole business. She had become aware that she could not endure the society + of Gerald Foster much longer. She got up and spoke decidedly. + </p> + <p> + “And now,” she said, “I'm going to tidy up.” + </p> + <p> + Gerald had other views. + </p> + <p> + “No,” he said with sudden solemnity. “No! Nothing of the kind. Leave it + for her to find. Leave it as it is.” + </p> + <p> + “Don't be silly. All this has got to be cleaned up. I'll do it. You go and + sit in my apartment. I'll come and tell you when you can come back.” + </p> + <p> + “No!” said Gerald, wagging his head. + </p> + <p> + Sally stamped her foot among the crackling ruins. Quite suddenly the sight + of him had become intolerable. + </p> + <p> + “Do as I tell you,” she cried. + </p> + <p> + Gerald wavered for a moment, but his brief militant mood was ebbing fast. + After a faint protest he shuffled off, and Sally heard him go into her + room. She breathed a deep breath of relief and turned to her task. + </p> + <p> + A visit to the kitchen revealed a long-handled broom, and, armed with + this, Sally was soon busy. She was an efficient little person, and + presently out of chaos there began to emerge a certain order. Nothing + short of complete re-decoration would ever make the place look habitable + again, but at the end of half an hour she had cleared the floor, and the + fragments of vases, plates, lamp-shades, pictures and glasses were stacked + in tiny heaps against the walls. She returned the broom to the kitchen, + and, going back into the sitting-room, flung open the window and stood + looking out. + </p> + <p> + With a sense of unreality she perceived that the night had gone. Over the + quiet street below there brooded that strange, metallic light which ushers + in the dawn of a fine day. A cold breeze whispered to and fro. Above the + house-tops the sky was a faint, level blue. + </p> + <p> + She left the window and started to cross the room. And suddenly there came + over her a feeling of utter weakness. She stumbled to a chair, conscious + only of being tired beyond the possibility of a further effort. Her eyes + closed, and almost before her head had touched the cushions she was + asleep. + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + Sally woke. Sunshine was streaming through the open window, and with it + the myriad noises of a city awake and about its business. Footsteps + clattered on the sidewalk, automobile horns were sounding, and she could + hear the clank of street cars as they passed over the points. She could + only guess at the hour, but it was evident that the morning was well + advanced. She got up stiffly. Her head was aching. + </p> + <p> + She went into the bathroom, bathed her face, and felt better. The dull + oppression which comes of a bad night was leaving her. She leaned out of + the window, revelling in the fresh air, then crossed the passage and + entered her own apartment. Stertorous breathing greeted her, and she + perceived that Gerald Foster had also passed the night in a chair. He was + sprawling by the window with his legs stretched out and his head resting + on one of the arms, an unlovely spectacle. + </p> + <p> + Sally stood regarding him for a moment with a return of the distaste which + she had felt on the previous night. And yet, mingled with the distaste, + there was a certain elation. A black chapter of her life was closed for + ever. Whatever the years to come might bring to her, they would be free + from any wistful yearnings for the man who had once been woven so + inextricably into the fabric of her life. She had thought that his + personality had gripped her too strongly ever to be dislodged, but now she + could look at him calmly and feel only a faint half-pity, half-contempt. + The glamour had departed. + </p> + <p> + She shook him gently, and he sat up with a start, blinking in the strong + light. His mouth was still open. He stared at Sally foolishly, then + scrambled awkwardly out of the chair. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, my God!” said Gerald, pressing both his hands to his forehead and + sitting down again. He licked his lips with a dry tongue and moaned. “Oh, + I've got a headache!” + </p> + <p> + Sally might have pointed out to him that he had certainly earned one, but + she refrained. + </p> + <p> + “You'd better go and have a wash,” she suggested. + </p> + <p> + “Yes,” said Gerald, heaving himself up again. + </p> + <p> + “Would you like some breakfast?” + </p> + <p> + “Don't!” said Gerald faintly, and tottered off to the bathroom. + </p> + <p> + Sally sat down in the chair he had vacated. She had never felt quite like + this before in her life. Everything seemed dreamlike. The splashing of + water in the bathroom came faintly to her, and she realized that she had + been on the point of falling asleep again. She got up and opened the + window, and once more the air acted as a restorative. She watched the + activities of the street with a distant interest. They, too, seemed + dreamlike and unreal. People were hurrying up and down on mysterious + errands. An inscrutable cat picked its way daintily across the road. At + the door of the apartment house an open car purred sleepily. + </p> + <p> + She was roused by a ring at the bell. She went to the door and opened it, + and found Bruce Carmyle standing on the threshold. He wore a light + motor-coat, and he was plainly endeavouring to soften the severity of his + saturnine face with a smile of beaming kindliness. + </p> + <p> + “Well, here I am!” said Bruce Carmyle cheerily. “Are you ready?” + </p> + <p> + With the coming of daylight a certain penitence had descended on Mr. + Carmyle. Thinking things over while shaving and subsequently in his bath, + he had come to the conclusion that his behaviour overnight had not been + all that could have been desired. He had not actually been brutal, + perhaps, but he had undoubtedly not been winning. There had been an + abruptness in the manner of his leaving Sally at the Flower Garden which a + perfect lover ought not to have shown. He had allowed his nerves to get + the better of him, and now he desired to make amends. Hence a cheerfulness + which he did not usually exhibit so early in the morning. + </p> + <p> + Sally was staring at him blankly. She had completely forgotten that he had + said that he would come and take her for a drive this morning. She + searched in her mind for words, and found none. And, as Mr. Carmyle was + debating within himself whether to kiss her now or wait for a more + suitable moment, embarrassment came upon them both like a fog, and the + genial smile faded from his face as if the motive-power behind it had + suddenly failed. + </p> + <p> + “I've—er—got the car outside, and...” + </p> + <p> + At this point speech failed Mr. Carmyle, for, even as he began the + sentence, the door that led to the bathroom opened and Gerald Foster came + out. Mr. Carmyle gaped at Gerald: Gerald gaped at Mr. Carmyle. + </p> + <p> + The application of cold water to the face and head is an excellent thing + on the morning after an imprudent night, but as a tonic it only goes part + of the way. In the case of Gerald Foster, which was an extremely serious + and aggravated case, it had gone hardly any way at all. The person unknown + who had been driving red-hot rivets into the base of Gerald Foster's skull + ever since the moment of his awakening was still busily engaged on that + task. He gazed at Mr. Carmyle wanly. + </p> + <p> + Bruce Carmyle drew in his breath with a sharp hiss, and stood rigid. His + eyes, burning now with a grim light, flickered over Gerald's person and + found nothing in it to entertain them. He saw a slouching figure in + shirt-sleeves and the foundations of evening dress, a disgusting, degraded + figure with pink eyes and a white face that needed a shave. And all the + doubts that had ever come to vex Mr. Carmyle's mind since his first + meeting with Sally became on the instant certainties. So Uncle Donald had + been right after all! This was the sort of girl she was! + </p> + <p> + At his elbow the stout phantom of Uncle Donald puffed with satisfaction. + </p> + <p> + “I told you so!” it said. + </p> + <p> + Sally had not moved. The situation was beyond her. Just as if this had + really been the dream it seemed, she felt incapable of speech or action. + </p> + <p> + “So...” said Mr. Carmyle, becoming articulate, and allowed an impressive + aposiopesis to take the place of the rest of the speech. A cold fury had + gripped him. He pointed at Gerald, began to speak, found that he was + stuttering, and gulped back the words. In this supreme moment he was not + going to have his dignity impaired by a stutter. He gulped and found a + sentence which, while brief enough to insure against this disaster, was + sufficiently long to express his meaning. + </p> + <p> + “Get out!” he said. + </p> + <p> + Gerald Foster had his dignity, too, and it seemed to him that the time had + come to assert it. But he also had a most excruciating headache, and when + he drew himself up haughtily to ask Mr. Carmyle what the devil he meant by + it, a severe access of pain sent him huddling back immediately to a safer + attitude. He clasped his forehead and groaned. + </p> + <p> + “Get out!” + </p> + <p> + For a moment Gerald hesitated. Then another sudden shooting spasm + convinced him that no profit or pleasure was to be derived from a + continuance of the argument, and he began to shamble slowly across to the + door. Bruce Carmyle watched him go with twitching hands. There was a + moment when the human man in him, somewhat atrophied from long disuse, + stirred him almost to the point of assault; then dignity whispered more + prudent counsel in his ear, and Gerald was past the danger-zone and out in + the passage. Mr. Carmyle turned to face Sally, as King Arthur on a similar + but less impressive occasion must have turned to deal with Guinevere. + </p> + <p> + “So...” he said again. + </p> + <p> + Sally was eyeing him steadily—considering the circumstances, Mr. + Carmyle thought with not a little indignation, much too steadily. + </p> + <p> + “This,” he said ponderously, “is very amusing.” + </p> + <p> + He waited for her to speak, but she said nothing. + </p> + <p> + “I might have expected it,” said Mr. Carmyle with a bitter laugh. + </p> + <p> + Sally forced herself from the lethargy which was gripping her. + </p> + <p> + “Would you like me to explain?” she said. + </p> + <p> + “There can be no explanation,” said Mr. Carmyle coldly. + </p> + <p> + “Very well,” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + There was a pause. + </p> + <p> + “Good-bye,” said Bruce Carmyle. + </p> + <p> + “Good-bye,” said Sally. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Carmyle walked to the door. There he stopped for an instant and + glanced back at her. Sally had walked to the window and was looking out. + For one swift instant something about her trim little figure and the gleam + of her hair where the sunlight shone on it seemed to catch at Bruce + Carmyle's heart, and he wavered. But the next moment he was strong again, + and the door had closed behind him with a resolute bang. + </p> + <p> + Out in the street, climbing into his car, he looked up involuntarily to + see if she was still there, but she had gone. As the car, gathering speed, + hummed down the street. Sally was at the telephone listening to the sleepy + voice of Ginger Kemp, which, as he became aware who it was that had woken + him from his rest and what she had to say to him, magically lost its + sleepiness and took on a note of riotous ecstasy. + </p> + <p> + Five minutes later, Ginger was splashing in his bath, singing + discordantly. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0018" id="link2HCH0018"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XVIII. JOURNEY'S END + </h2> + <p> + Darkness was beginning to gather slowly and with almost an apologetic air, + as if it regretted the painful duty of putting an end to the perfect + summer day. Over to the west beyond the trees there still lingered a faint + afterglow, and a new moon shone like a silver sickle above the big barn. + Sally came out of the house and bowed gravely three times for luck. She + stood on the gravel, outside the porch, drinking in the sweet evening + scents, and found life good. + </p> + <p> + The darkness, having shown a certain reluctance at the start, was now + buckling down to make a quick and thorough job of it. The sky turned to a + uniform dark blue, picked out with quiet stars. The cement of the state + road which led to Patchogue, Babylon, and other important centres ceased + to be a pale blur and became invisible. Lights appeared in the windows of + the houses across the meadows. From the direction of the kennels there + came a single sleepy bark, and the small white woolly dog which had + scampered out at Sally's heels stopped short and uttered a challenging + squeak. + </p> + <p> + The evening was so still that Ginger's footsteps, as he pounded along the + road on his way back from the village, whither he had gone to buy + provisions, evening papers, and wool for the sweater which Sally was + knitting, were audible long before he turned in at the gate. Sally could + not see him, but she looked in the direction of the sound and once again + felt that pleasant, cosy thrill of happiness which had come to her every + evening for the last year. + </p> + <p> + “Ginger,” she called. + </p> + <p> + “What ho!” + </p> + <p> + The woolly dog, with another important squeak, scuttled down the drive to + look into the matter, and was coldly greeted. Ginger, for all his love of + dogs, had never been able to bring himself to regard Toto with affection. + He had protested when Sally, a month before, finding Mrs. Meecher + distraught on account of a dreadful lethargy which had seized her pet, had + begged him to offer hospitality and country air to the invalid. + </p> + <p> + “It's wonderful what you've done for Toto, angel,” said Sally, as he came + up frigidly eluding that curious animal's leaps of welcome. “He's a + different dog.” + </p> + <p> + “Bit of luck for him,” said Ginger. + </p> + <p> + “In all the years I was at Mrs. Meecher's I never knew him move at + anything more rapid than a stately walk. Now he runs about all the time.” + </p> + <p> + “The blighter had been overeating from birth,” said Ginger. “That was all + that was wrong with him. A little judicious dieting put him right. We'll + be able,” said Ginger brightening, “to ship him back next week.” + </p> + <p> + “I shall quite miss him.” + </p> + <p> + “I nearly missed him—this morning—with a shoe,” said Ginger. + “He was up on the kitchen table wolfing the bacon, and I took steps.” + </p> + <p> + “My cave-man!” murmured Sally. “I always said you had a frightfully brutal + streak in you. Ginger, what an evening!” + </p> + <p> + “Good Lord!” said Ginger suddenly, as they walked into the light of the + open kitchen door. + </p> + <p> + “Now what?” + </p> + <p> + He stopped and eyed her intently. + </p> + <p> + “Do you know you're looking prettier than you were when I started down to + the village!” + </p> + <p> + Sally gave his arm a little hug. + </p> + <p> + “Beloved!” she said. “Did you get the chops?” + </p> + <p> + Ginger froze in his tracks, horrified. + </p> + <p> + “Oh, my aunt! I clean forgot them!” + </p> + <p> + “Oh, Ginger, you are an old chump. Well, you'll have to go in for a little + judicious dieting, like Toto.” + </p> + <p> + “I say, I'm most awfully sorry. I got the wool.” + </p> + <p> + “If you think I'm going to eat wool...” + </p> + <p> + “Isn't there anything in the house?” + </p> + <p> + “Vegetables and fruit.” + </p> + <p> + “Fine! But, of course, if you want chops...” + </p> + <p> + “Not at all. I'm spiritual. Besides, people say that vegetables are good + for the blood-pressure or something. Of course you forgot to get the mail, + too?” + </p> + <p> + “Absolutely not! I was on to it like a knife. Two letters from fellows + wanting Airedale puppies.” + </p> + <p> + “No! Ginger, we are getting on!” + </p> + <p> + “Pretty bloated,” agreed Ginger complacently. “Pretty bloated. We'll be + able to get that two-seater if things go buzzing on like this. There was a + letter for you. Here it is.” + </p> + <p> + “It's from Fillmore,” said Sally, examining the envelope as they went into + the kitchen. “And about time, too. I haven't had a word from him for + months.” + </p> + <p> + She sat down and opened the letter. Ginger, heaving himself on to the + table, wriggled into a position of comfort and started to read his evening + paper. But after he had skimmed over the sporting page he lowered it and + allowed his gaze to rest on Sally's bent head with a feeling of utter + contentment. + </p> + <p> + Although a married man of nearly a year's standing, Ginger was still + moving about a magic world in a state of dazed incredulity, unable fully + to realize that such bliss could be. Ginger in his time had seen many + things that looked good from a distance, but not one that had borne the + test of a closer acquaintance—except this business of marriage. + </p> + <p> + Marriage, with Sally for a partner, seemed to be one of the very few + things in the world in which there was no catch. His honest eyes glowed as + he watched her. Sally broke into a little splutter of laughter. + </p> + <p> + “Ginger, look at this!” + </p> + <p> + He reached down and took the slip of paper which she held out to him. The + following legend met his eye, printed in bold letters: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + POPP'S + + OUTSTANDING + + SUCCULENT——APPETIZING——NUTRITIOUS. +</pre> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + (JUST SAY “POP!” A CHILD + + CAN DO IT.) +</pre> + <p> + Ginger regarded this cipher with a puzzled frown. + </p> + <p> + “What is it?” he asked. + </p> + <p> + “It's Fillmore.” + </p> + <p> + “How do you mean?” + </p> + <p> + Sally gurgled. + </p> + <p> + “Fillmore and Gladys have started a little restaurant in Pittsburg.” + </p> + <p> + “A restaurant!” There was a shocked note in Ginger's voice. Although he + knew that the managerial career of that modern Napoleon, his + brother-in-law, had terminated in something of a smash, he had never quite + lost his reverence for one whom he considered a bit of a master-mind. That + Fillmore Nicholas, the Man of Destiny, should have descended to conducting + a restaurant—and a little restaurant at that—struck him as + almost indecent. + </p> + <p> + Sally, on the other hand—for sisters always seem to fail in proper + reverence for the greatness of their brothers—was delighted. + </p> + <p> + “It's the most splendid idea,” she said with enthusiasm. “It really does + look as if Fillmore was going to amount to something at last. Apparently + they started on quite a small scale, just making pork-pies...” + </p> + <p> + “Why Popp?” interrupted Ginger, ventilating a question which was + perplexing him deeply. + </p> + <p> + “Just a trade name, silly. Gladys is a wonderful cook, you know, and she + made the pies and Fillmore toddled round selling them. And they did so + well that now they've started a regular restaurant, and that's a success, + too. Listen to this.” Sally gurgled again and turned over the letter. + “Where is it? Oh yes! '... sound financial footing. In fact, our success + has been so instantaneous that I have decided to launch out on a really + big scale. It is Big Ideas that lead to Big Business. I am contemplating a + vast extension of this venture of ours, and in a very short time I shall + organize branches in New York, Chicago, Detroit, and all the big cities, + each in charge of a manager and each offering as a special feature, in + addition to the usual restaurant cuisine, these Popp's Outstanding + Pork-pies of ours. That done, and having established all these branches as + going concerns, I shall sail for England and introduce Popp's Pork-pies + there...' Isn't he a little wonder!” + </p> + <p> + “Dashed brainy chap. Always said so.” + </p> + <p> + “I must say I was rather uneasy when I read that. I've seen so many of + Fillmore's Big Ideas. That's always the way with him. He gets something + good and then goes and overdoes it and bursts. However, it's all right now + that he's got Gladys to look after him. She has added a postscript. Just + four words, but oh! how comforting to a sister's heart. 'Yes, I don't + think!' is what she says, and I don't know when I've read anything more + cheering. Thank heaven, she's got poor dear Fillmore well in hand.” + </p> + <p> + “Pork-pies!” said Ginger, musingly, as the pangs of a healthy hunger began + to assail his interior. “I wish he'd sent us one of the outstanding little + chaps. I could do with it.” + </p> + <p> + Sally got up and ruffled his red hair. + </p> + <p> + “Poor old Ginger! I knew you'd never be able to stick it. Come on, it's a + lovely night, let's walk to the village and revel at the inn. We're going + to be millionaires before we know where we are, so we can afford it.” + </p> + <p> + THE END <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Adventures of Sally, by P. G. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Adventures of Sally + +Author: P. G. Wodehouse + +Release Date: February, 2005 [EBook #7464] +[This file last updated on July 17, 2010] +Posting Date: July 31, 2009 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ADVENTURES OF SALLY *** + + + + +Produced by Tim Barnett + + + + + +THE ADVENTURES OF SALLY + + +By P. G. Wodehouse + + + + + +CHAPTER I. SALLY GIVES A PARTY + + + +1 + +Sally looked contentedly down the long table. She felt happy at last. +Everybody was talking and laughing now, and her party, rallying after an +uncertain start, was plainly the success she had hoped it would be. The +first atmosphere of uncomfortable restraint, caused, she was only too +well aware, by her brother Fillmore's white evening waistcoat, had +worn off; and the male and female patrons of Mrs. Meecher's select +boarding-house (transient and residential) were themselves again. + +At her end of the table the conversation had turned once more to the +great vital topic of Sally's legacy and what she ought to do with it. +The next best thing to having money of one's own, is to dictate the +spending of somebody else's, and Sally's guests were finding a good deal +of satisfaction in arranging a Budget for her. Rumour having put the +sum at their disposal at a high figure, their suggestions had certain +spaciousness. + +"Let me tell you," said Augustus Bartlett, briskly, "what I'd do, if +I were you." Augustus Bartlett, who occupied an intensely subordinate +position in the firm of Kahn, Morris and Brown, the Wall Street brokers, +always affected a brisk, incisive style of speech, as befitted a man +in close touch with the great ones of Finance. "I'd sink a couple of +hundred thousand in some good, safe bond-issue--we've just put one out +which you would do well to consider--and play about with the rest. When +I say play about, I mean have a flutter in anything good that crops up. +Multiple Steel's worth looking at. They tell me it'll be up to a hundred +and fifty before next Saturday." + +Elsa Doland, the pretty girl with the big eyes who sat on Mr. Bartlett's +left, had other views. + +"Buy a theatre. Sally, and put on good stuff." + +"And lose every bean you've got," said a mild young man, with a deep +voice across the table. "If I had a few hundred thousand," said the +mild young man, "I'd put every cent of it on Benny Whistler for the +heavyweight championship. I've private information that Battling Tuke +has been got at and means to lie down in the seventh..." + +"Say, listen," interrupted another voice, "lemme tell you what I'd do +with four hundred thousand..." + +"If I had four hundred thousand," said Elsa Doland, "I know what would +be the first thing I'd do." + +"What's that?" asked Sally. + +"Pay my bill for last week, due this morning." + +Sally got up quickly, and flitting down the table, put her arm round her +friend's shoulder and whispered in her ear: + +"Elsa darling, are you really broke? If you are, you know, I'll..." + +Elsa Doland laughed. + +"You're an angel, Sally. There's no one like you. You'd give your last +cent to anyone. Of course I'm not broke. I've just come back from the +road, and I've saved a fortune. I only said that to draw you." + +Sally returned to her seat, relieved, and found that the company had now +divided itself into two schools of thought. The conservative and prudent +element, led by Augustus Bartlett, had definitely decided on three +hundred thousand in Liberty Bonds and the rest in some safe real estate; +while the smaller, more sporting section, impressed by the mild young +man's inside information, had already placed Sally's money on Benny +Whistler, doling it out cautiously in small sums so as not to spoil the +market. And so solid, it seemed, was Mr. Tuke's reputation with those +in the inner circle of knowledge that the mild young man was confident +that, if you went about the matter cannily and without precipitation, +three to one might be obtained. It seemed to Sally that the time had +come to correct certain misapprehensions. + +"I don't know where you get your figures," she said, "but I'm afraid +they're wrong. I've just twenty-five thousand dollars." + +The statement had a chilling effect. To these jugglers with +half-millions the amount mentioned seemed for the moment almost too +small to bother about. It was the sort of sum which they had been +mentally setting aside for the heiress's car fare. Then they managed to +adjust their minds to it. After all, one could do something even with a +pittance like twenty-five thousand. + +"If I'd twenty-five thousand," said Augustus Bartlett, the first to +rally from the shock, "I'd buy Amalgamated..." + +"If I had twenty-five thousand..." began Elsa Doland. + +"If I'd had twenty-five thousand in the year nineteen hundred," observed +a gloomy-looking man with spectacles, "I could have started a revolution +in Paraguay." + +He brooded sombrely on what might have been. + +"Well, I'll tell you exactly what I'm going to do," said Sally. "I'm +going to start with a trip to Europe... France, specially. I've heard +France well spoken of--as soon as I can get my passport; and after I've +loafed there for a few weeks, I'm coming back to look about and find +some nice cosy little business which will let me put money into it and +keep me in luxury. Are there any complaints?" + +"Even a couple of thousand on Benny Whistler..." said the mild young +man. + +"I don't want your Benny Whistler," said Sally. "I wouldn't have him if +you gave him to me. If I want to lose money, I'll go to Monte Carlo and +do it properly." + +"Monte Carlo," said the gloomy man, brightening up at the magic name. +"I was in Monte Carlo in the year '97, and if I'd had another fifty +dollars... just fifty... I'd have..." + +At the far end of the table there was a stir, a cough, and the grating +of a chair on the floor; and slowly, with that easy grace which actors +of the old school learned in the days when acting was acting, Mr. +Maxwell Faucitt, the boarding-house's oldest inhabitant, rose to his +feet. + +"Ladies," said Mr. Faucitt, bowing courteously, "and..." ceasing to bow +and casting from beneath his white and venerable eyebrows a quelling +glance at certain male members of the boarding-house's younger set who +were showing a disposition towards restiveness, "... gentlemen. I feel +that I cannot allow this occasion to pass without saying a few words." + +His audience did not seem surprised. It was possible that life, always +prolific of incident in a great city like New York, might some day +produce an occasion which Mr. Faucitt would feel that he could allow to +pass without saying a few words; but nothing of the sort had happened as +yet, and they had given up hope. Right from the start of the meal they +had felt that it would be optimism run mad to expect the old gentleman +to abstain from speech on the night of Sally Nicholas' farewell +dinner party; and partly because they had braced themselves to it, but +principally because Miss Nicholas' hospitality had left them with a +genial feeling of repletion, they settled themselves to listen +with something resembling equanimity. A movement on the part of the +Marvellous Murphys--new arrivals, who had been playing the Bushwick with +their equilibristic act during the preceding week--to form a party of +the extreme left and heckle the speaker, broke down under a cold look +from their hostess. Brief though their acquaintance had been, both of +these lissom young gentlemen admired Sally immensely. + +And it should be set on record that this admiration of theirs was not +misplaced. He would have been hard to please who had not been attracted +by Sally. She was a small, trim, wisp of a girl with the tiniest hands +and feet, the friendliest of smiles, and a dimple that came and went +in the curve of her rounded chin. Her eyes, which disappeared when she +laughed, which was often, were a bright hazel; her hair a soft mass of +brown. She had, moreover, a manner, an air of distinction lacking in the +majority of Mrs. Meecher's guests. And she carried youth like a banner. +In approving of Sally, the Marvellous Murphys had been guilty of no +lapse from their high critical standard. + +"I have been asked," proceeded Mr. Faucitt, "though I am aware that +there are others here far worthier of such a task--Brutuses compared +with whom I, like Marc Antony, am no orator--I have been asked to +propose the health..." + +"Who asked you?" It was the smaller of the Marvellous Murphys who spoke. +He was an unpleasant youth, snub-nosed and spotty. Still, he could +balance himself with one hand on an inverted ginger-ale bottle while +revolving a barrel on the soles of his feet. There is good in all of us. + +"I have been asked," repeated Mr. Faucitt, ignoring the unmannerly +interruption, which, indeed, he would have found it hard to answer, "to +propose the health of our charming hostess (applause), coupled with the +name of her brother, our old friend Fillmore Nicholas." + +The gentleman referred to, who sat at the speaker's end of the table, +acknowledged the tribute with a brief nod of the head. It was a nod of +condescension; the nod of one who, conscious of being hedged about by +social inferiors, nevertheless does his best to be not unkindly. And +Sally, seeing it, debated in her mind for an instant the advisability +of throwing an orange at her brother. There was one lying ready to her +hand, and his glistening shirt-front offered an admirable mark; but +she restrained herself. After all, if a hostess yields to her primitive +impulses, what happens? Chaos. She had just frowned down the exuberance +of the rebellious Murphys, and she felt that if, even with the highest +motives, she began throwing fruit, her influence for good in that +quarter would be weakened. + +She leaned back with a sigh. The temptation had been hard to resist. A +democratic girl, pomposity was a quality which she thoroughly disliked; +and though she loved him, she could not disguise from herself that, +ever since affluence had descended upon him some months ago, her brother +Fillmore had become insufferably pompous. If there are any young men +whom inherited wealth improves, Fillmore Nicholas was not one of them. +He seemed to regard himself nowadays as a sort of Man of Destiny. To +converse with him was for the ordinary human being like being received +in audience by some more than stand-offish monarch. It had taken Sally +over an hour to persuade him to leave his apartment on Riverside Drive +and revisit the boarding-house for this special occasion; and, when he +had come, he had entered wearing such faultless evening dress that he +had made the rest of the party look like a gathering of tramp-cyclists. +His white waistcoat alone was a silent reproach to honest poverty, +and had caused an awkward constraint right through the soup and fish +courses. Most of those present had known Fillmore Nicholas as an +impecunious young man who could make a tweed suit last longer than one +would have believed possible; they had called him "Fill" and helped him +in more than usually lean times with small loans: but to-night they had +eyed the waistcoat dumbly and shrank back abashed. + +"Speaking," said Mr. Faucitt, "as an Englishman--for though I have long +since taken out what are technically known as my 'papers' it was as a +subject of the island kingdom that I first visited this great country--I +may say that the two factors in American life which have always made +the profoundest impression upon me have been the lavishness of American +hospitality and the charm of the American girl. To-night we have been +privileged to witness the American girl in the capacity of hostess, and +I think I am right in saying, in asseverating, in committing myself to +the statement that this has been a night which none of us present here +will ever forget. Miss Nicholas has given us, ladies and gentlemen, a +banquet. I repeat, a banquet. There has been alcoholic refreshment. I +do not know where it came from: I do not ask how it was procured, but we +have had it. Miss Nicholas..." + +Mr. Faucitt paused to puff at his cigar. Sally's brother Fillmore +suppressed a yawn and glanced at his watch. Sally continued to lean +forward raptly. She knew how happy it made the old gentleman to deliver +a formal speech; and though she wished the subject had been different, +she was prepared to listen indefinitely. + +"Miss Nicholas," resumed Mr. Faucitt, lowering his cigar, "... But why," +he demanded abruptly, "do I call her Miss Nicholas?" + +"Because it's her name," hazarded the taller Murphy. + +Mr. Faucitt eyed him with disfavour. He disapproved of the marvellous +brethren on general grounds because, himself a resident of years +standing, he considered that these transients from the vaudeville stage +lowered the tone of the boarding-house; but particularly because the one +who had just spoken had, on his first evening in the place, addressed +him as "grandpa." + +"Yes, sir," he said severely, "it is her name. But she has another name, +sweeter to those who love her, those who worship her, those who have +watched her with the eye of sedulous affection through the three years +she has spent beneath this roof, though that name," said Mr. Faucitt, +lowering the tone of his address and descending to what might almost be +termed personalities, "may not be familiar to a couple of dud acrobats +who have only been in the place a week-end, thank heaven, and are off +to-morrow to infest some other city. That name," said Mr. Faucitt, +soaring once more to a loftier plane, "is Sally. Our Sally. For three +years our Sally has flitted about this establishment like--I choose the +simile advisedly--like a ray of sunshine. For three years she has +made life for us a brighter, sweeter thing. And now a sudden access of +worldly wealth, happily synchronizing with her twenty-first birthday, is +to remove her from our midst. From our midst, ladies and gentlemen, +but not from our hearts. And I think I may venture to hope, to +prognosticate, that, whatever lofty sphere she may adorn in the future, +to whatever heights in the social world she may soar, she will still +continue to hold a corner in her own golden heart for the comrades of +her Bohemian days. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you our hostess, Miss +Sally Nicholas, coupled with the name of our old friend, her brother +Fillmore." + +Sally, watching her brother heave himself to his feet as the cheers died +away, felt her heart beat a little faster with anticipation. Fillmore +was a fluent young man, once a power in his college debating society, +and it was for that reason that she had insisted on his coming here +tonight. + +She had guessed that Mr. Faucitt, the old dear, would say all sorts of +delightful things about her, and she had mistrusted her ability to +make a fitting reply. And it was imperative that a fitting reply should +proceed from someone. She knew Mr. Faucitt so well. He looked on these +occasions rather in the light of scenes from some play; and, sustaining +his own part in them with such polished grace, was certain to be pained +by anything in the nature of an anti-climax after he should have ceased +to take the stage. Eloquent himself, he must be answered with eloquence, +or his whole evening would be spoiled. + +Fillmore Nicholas smoothed a wrinkle out of his white waistcoat; and +having rested one podgy hand on the table-cloth and the thumb of the +other in his pocket, glanced down the table with eyes so haughtily +drooping that Sally's fingers closed automatically about her orange, as +she wondered whether even now it might not be a good thing... + +It seems to be one of Nature's laws that the most attractive girls +should have the least attractive brothers. Fillmore Nicholas had not +worn well. At the age of seven he had been an extraordinarily beautiful +child, but after that he had gone all to pieces; and now, at the age of +twenty-five, it would be idle to deny that he was something of a mess. +For the three years preceding his twenty-fifth birthday, restricted +means and hard work had kept his figure in check; but with money there +had come an ever-increasing sleekness. He looked as if he fed too often +and too well. + +All this, however, Sally was prepared to forgive him, if he would only +make a good speech. She could see Mr. Faucitt leaning back in his chair, +all courteous attention. Rolling periods were meat and drink to the old +gentleman. + +Fillmore spoke. + +"I'm sure," said Fillmore, "you don't want a speech... Very good of you +to drink our health. Thank you." + +He sat down. + +The effect of these few simple words on the company was marked, but not +in every case identical. To the majority the emotion which they brought +was one of unmixed relief. There had been something so menacing, so easy +and practised, in Fillmore's attitude as he had stood there that the +gloomier-minded had given him at least twenty minutes, and even the +optimists had reckoned that they would be lucky if they got off with +ten. As far as the bulk of the guests were concerned, there was +no grumbling. Fillmore's, to their thinking, had been the ideal +after-dinner speech. + +Far different was it with Mr. Maxwell Faucitt. The poor old man was +wearing such an expression of surprise and dismay as he might have +worn had somebody unexpectedly pulled the chair from under him. He was +feeling the sick shock which comes to those who tread on a non-existent +last stair. And Sally, catching sight of his face, uttered a sharp +wordless exclamation as if she had seen a child fall down and hurt +itself in the street. The next moment she had run round the table and +was standing behind him with her arms round his neck. She spoke across +him with a sob in her voice. + +"My brother," she stammered, directing a malevolent look at the +immaculate Fillmore, who, avoiding her gaze, glanced down his nose +and smoothed another wrinkle out of his waistcoat, "has not said +quite--quite all I hoped he was going to say. I can't make a speech, +but..." Sally gulped, "... but, I love you all and of course I shall +never forget you, and... and..." + +Here Sally kissed Mr. Faucitt and burst into tears. + +"There, there," said Mr. Faucitt, soothingly. The kindest critic could +not have claimed that Sally had been eloquent: nevertheless Mr. Maxwell +Faucitt was conscious of no sense of anti-climax. + + + +2 + + + +Sally had just finished telling her brother Fillmore what a pig he was. +The lecture had taken place in the street outside the boarding-house +immediately on the conclusion of the festivities, when Fillmore, who +had furtively collected his hat and overcoat, had stolen forth into the +night, had been overtaken and brought to bay by his justly indignant +sister. Her remarks, punctuated at intervals by bleating sounds from the +accused, had lasted some ten minutes. + +As she paused for breath, Fillmore seemed to expand, like an indiarubber +ball which has been sat on. Dignified as he was to the world, he had +never been able to prevent himself being intimidated by Sally when +in one of these moods of hers. He regretted this, for it hurt his +self-esteem, but he did not see how the fact could be altered. Sally +had always been like that. Even the uncle, who after the deaths of their +parents had become their guardian, had never, though a grim man, been +able to cope successfully with Sally. In that last hectic scene three +years ago, which had ended in their going out into the world, together +like a second Adam and Eve, the verbal victory had been hers. And it +had been Sally who had achieved triumph in the one battle which Mrs. +Meecher, apparently as a matter of duty, always brought about with each +of her patrons in the first week of their stay. A sweet-tempered +girl, Sally, like most women of a generous spirit, had cyclonic +potentialities. + +As she seemed to have said her say, Fillmore kept on expanding till he +had reached the normal, when he ventured upon a speech for the defence. + +"What have I done?" demanded Fillmore plaintively. + +"Do you want to hear all over again?" + +"No, no," said Fillmore hastily. "But, listen. Sally, you don't +understand my position. You don't seem to realize that all that sort of +thing, all that boarding-house stuff, is a thing of the past. One's got +beyond it. One wants to drop it. One wants to forget it, darn it! Be +fair. Look at it from my viewpoint. I'm going to be a big man..." + +"You're going to be a fat man," said Sally, coldly. + +Fillmore refrained from discussing the point. He was sensitive. + +"I'm going to do big things," he substituted. "I've got a deal on at +this very moment which... well, I can't tell you about it, but it's +going to be big. Well, what I'm driving at, is about all this sort of +thing"--he indicated the lighted front of Mrs. Meecher's home-from-home +with a wide gesture--"is that it's over. Finished and done with. These +people were all very well when..." + +"... when you'd lost your week's salary at poker and wanted to borrow a +few dollars for the rent." + +"I always paid them back," protested Fillmore, defensively. + +"I did." + +"Well, we did," said Fillmore, accepting the amendment with the air of +a man who has no time for chopping straws. "Anyway, what I mean is, I +don't see why, just because one has known people at a certain period in +one's life when one was practically down and out, one should have +them round one's neck for ever. One can't prevent people forming an +I-knew-him-when club, but, darn it, one needn't attend the meetings." + +"One's friends..." + +"Oh, friends," said Fillmore. "That's just where all this makes me so +tired. One's in a position where all these people are entitled to call +themselves one's friends, simply because father put it in his will that +I wasn't to get the money till I was twenty-five, instead of letting me +have it at twenty-one like anybody else. I wonder where I should have +been by now if I could have got that money when I was twenty-one." + +"In the poor-house, probably," said Sally. + +Fillmore was wounded. + +"Ah! you don't believe in me," he sighed. + +"Oh, you would be all right if you had one thing," said Sally. + +Fillmore passed his qualities in swift review before his mental eye. +Brains? Dash? Spaciousness? Initiative? All present and correct. He +wondered where Sally imagined the hiatus to exist. + +"One thing?" he said. "What's that?" + +"A nurse." + +Fillmore's sense of injury deepened. He supposed that this was always +the way, that those nearest to a man never believed in his ability +till he had proved it so masterfully that it no longer required the +assistance of faith. Still, it was trying; and there was not much +consolation to be derived from the thought that Napoleon had had to go +through this sort of thing in his day. "I shall find my place in the +world," he said sulkily. + +"Oh, you'll find your place all right," said Sally. "And I'll come +round and bring you jelly and read to you on the days when visitors are +allowed... Oh, hullo." + +The last remark was addressed to a young man who had been swinging +briskly along the sidewalk from the direction of Broadway and who now, +coming abreast of them, stopped. + +"Good evening, Mr. Foster." + +"Good evening. Miss Nicholas." + +"You don't know my brother, do you?" + +"I don't believe I do." + +"He left the underworld before you came to it," said Sally. "You +wouldn't think it to look at him, but he was once a prune-eater among +the proletariat, even as you and I. Mrs. Meecher looks on him as a son." + +The two men shook hands. Fillmore was not short, but Gerald Foster +with his lean, well-built figure seemed to tower over him. He was an +Englishman, a man in the middle twenties, clean-shaven, keen-eyed, and +very good to look at. Fillmore, who had recently been going in for one +of those sum-up-your-fellow-man-at-a-glance courses, the better to fit +himself for his career of greatness, was rather impressed. It seemed to +him that this Mr. Foster, like himself, was one of those who Get There. +If you are that kind yourself, you get into the knack of recognizing the +others. It is a sort of gift. + +There was a few moments of desultory conversation, of the kind that +usually follows an introduction, and then Fillmore, by no means sorry +to get the chance, took advantage of the coming of this new arrival to +remove himself. He had not enjoyed his chat with Sally, and it seemed +probable that he would enjoy a continuation of it even less. He was glad +that Mr. Foster had happened along at this particular juncture. Excusing +himself briefly, he hurried off down the street. + +Sally stood for a minute, watching him till he had disappeared round the +corner. She had a slightly regretful feeling that, now it was too late, +she would think of a whole lot more good things which it would have been +agreeable to say to him. And it had become obvious to her that Fillmore +was not getting nearly enough of that kind of thing said to him +nowadays. Then she dismissed him from her mind and turning to Gerald +Foster, slipped her arm through his. + +"Well, Jerry, darling," she said. "What a shame you couldn't come to the +party. Tell me all about everything." + + + +3 + + + +It was exactly two months since Sally had become engaged to Gerald +Foster; but so rigorously had they kept the secret that nobody at Mrs. +Meecher's so much as suspected it. To Sally, who all her life had hated +concealing things, secrecy of any kind was objectionable: but in this +matter Gerald had shown an odd streak almost of furtiveness in his +character. An announced engagement complicated life. People fussed about +you and bothered you. People either watched you or avoided you. Such +were his arguments, and Sally, who would have glossed over and found +excuses for a disposition on his part towards homicide or arson, put +them down to artistic sensitiveness. There is nobody so sensitive as +your artist, particularly if he be unsuccessful: and when an artist has +so little success that he cannot afford to make a home for the woman +he loves, his sensitiveness presumably becomes great indeed. Putting +herself in his place, Sally could see that a protracted engagement, +known by everybody, would be a standing advertisement of Gerald's +failure to make good: and she acquiesced in the policy of secrecy, +hoping that it would not last long. It seemed absurd to think of Gerald +as an unsuccessful man. He had in him, as the recent Fillmore had +perceived, something dynamic. He was one of those men of whom one could +predict that they would succeed very suddenly and rapidly--overnight, as +it were. + +"The party," said Sally, "went off splendidly." They had passed the +boarding-house door, and were walking slowly down the street. "Everybody +enjoyed themselves, I think, even though Fillmore did his best to spoil +things by coming looking like an advertisement of What The Smart Men +Will Wear This Season. You didn't see his waistcoat just now. He +had covered it up. Conscience, I suppose. It was white and bulgy and +gleaming and full up of pearl buttons and everything. I saw Augustus +Bartlett curl up like a burnt feather when he caught sight of it. Still, +time seemed to heal the wound, and everybody relaxed after a bit. Mr. +Faucitt made a speech and I made a speech and cried, and...oh, it was +all very festive. It only needed you." + +"I wish I could have come. I had to go to that dinner, though. Sally..." +Gerald paused, and Sally saw that he was electric with suppressed +excitement. "Sally, the play's going to be put on!" + +Sally gave a little gasp. She had lived this moment in anticipation for +weeks. She had always known that sooner or later this would happen. She +had read his plays over and over again, and was convinced that they were +wonderful. Of course, hers was a biased view, but then Elsa Doland also +admired them; and Elsa's opinion was one that carried weight. Elsa was +another of those people who were bound to succeed suddenly. Even old Mr. +Faucitt, who was a stern judge of acting and rather inclined to consider +that nowadays there was no such thing, believed that she was a girl with +a future who would do something big directly she got her chance. + +"Jerry!" She gave his arm a hug. "How simply terrific! Then Goble and +Kohn have changed their minds after all and want it? I knew they would." + +A slight cloud seemed to dim the sunniness of the author's mood. + +"No, not that one," he said reluctantly. "No hope there, I'm afraid. I +saw Goble this morning about that, and he said it didn't add up right. +The one that's going to be put on is 'The Primrose Way.' You remember? +It's got a big part for a girl in it." + +"Of course! The one Elsa liked so much. Well, that's just as good. Who's +going to do it? I thought you hadn't sent it out again." + +"Well, it happens..." Gerald hesitated once more. "It seems that this +man I was dining with to-night--a man named Cracknell..." + +"Cracknell? Not the Cracknell?" + +"The Cracknell?" + +"The one people are always talking about. The man they call the +Millionaire Kid." + +"Yes. Why, do you know him?" + +"He was at Harvard with Fillmore. I never saw him, but he must be rather +a painful person." + +"Oh, he's all right. Not much brains, of course, but--well, he's all +right. And, anyway, he wants to put the play on." + +"Well, that's splendid," said Sally: but she could not get the right +ring of enthusiasm into her voice. She had had ideals for Gerald. She +had dreamed of him invading Broadway triumphantly under the banner of +one of the big managers whose name carried a prestige, and there seemed +something unworthy in this association with a man whose chief claim to +eminence lay in the fact that he was credited by metropolitan gossip +with possessing the largest private stock of alcohol in existence. + +"I thought you would be pleased," said Gerald. + +"Oh, I am," said Sally. + +With the buoyant optimism which never deserted her for long, she had +already begun to cast off her momentary depression. After all, did +it matter who financed a play so long as it obtained a production? A +manager was simply a piece of machinery for paying the bills; and if +he had money for that purpose, why demand asceticism and the finer +sensibilities from him? The real thing that mattered was the question +of who was going to play the leading part, that deftly drawn character +which had so excited the admiration of Elsa Doland. She sought +information on this point. + +"Who will play Ruth?" she asked. "You must have somebody wonderful. It +needs a tremendously clever woman. Did Mr. Cracknell say anything about +that?" + +"Oh, yes, we discussed that, of course." + +"Well?" + +"Well, it seems..." Again Sally noticed that odd, almost stealthy +embarrassment. Gerald appeared unable to begin a sentence to-night +without feeling his way into it like a man creeping cautiously down a +dark alley. She noticed it the more because it was so different from +his usual direct method. Gerald, as a rule, was not one of those who +apologize for themselves. He was forthright and masterful and inclined +to talk to her from a height. To-night he seemed different. + +He broke off, was silent for a moment, and began again with a question. + +"Do you know Mabel Hobson?" + +"Mabel Hobson? I've seen her in the 'Follies,' of course." + +Sally started. A suspicion had stung her, so monstrous that its +absurdity became manifest the moment it had formed. And yet was +it absurd? Most Broadway gossip filtered eventually into the +boarding-house, chiefly through the medium of that seasoned sport, the +mild young man who thought so highly of the redoubtable Benny Whistler, +and she was aware that the name of Reginald Cracknell, which was always +getting itself linked with somebody, had been coupled with that of Miss +Hobson. It seemed likely that in this instance rumour spoke truth, +for the lady was of that compellingly blonde beauty which attracts the +Cracknells of this world. But even so... + +"It seems that Cracknell..." said Gerald. "Apparently this man +Cracknell..." He was finding Sally's bright, horrified gaze somewhat +trying. "Well, the fact is Cracknell believes in Mabel Hobson...and... +well, he thinks this part would suit her." + +"Oh, Jerry!" + +Could infatuation go to such a length? Could even the spacious heart of +a Reginald Cracknell so dominate that gentleman's small size in heads as +to make him entrust a part like Ruth in "The Primrose Way" to one who, +when desired by the producer of her last revue to carry a bowl of roses +across the stage and place it on a table, had rebelled on the plea that +she had not been engaged as a dancer? Surely even lovelorn Reginald +could perceive that this was not the stuff of which great emotional +actresses are made. + +"Oh, Jerry!" she said again. + +There was an uncomfortable silence. They turned and walked back in the +direction of the boarding-house. Somehow Gerald's arm had managed to get +itself detached from Sally's. She was conscious of a curious dull ache +that was almost like a physical pain. + +"Jerry! Is it worth it?" she burst out vehemently. + +The question seemed to sting the young man into something like his usual +decisive speech. + +"Worth it? Of course it's worth it. It's a Broadway production. That's +all that matters. Good heavens! I've been trying long enough to get a +play on Broadway, and it isn't likely that I'm going to chuck away my +chance when it comes along just because one might do better in the way +of casting." + +"But, Jerry! Mabel Hobson! It's... it's murder! Murder in the first +degree." + +"Nonsense. She'll be all right. The part will play itself. Besides, +she has a personality and a following, and Cracknell will spend all the +money in the world to make the thing a success. And it will be a start, +whatever happens. Of course, it's worth it." + +Fillmore would have been impressed by this speech. He would have +recognized and respected in it the unmistakable ring which characterizes +even the lightest utterances of those who get there. On Sally it had not +immediately that effect. Nevertheless, her habit of making the best of +things, working together with that primary article of her creed that +the man she loved could do no wrong, succeeded finally in raising her +spirits. Of course Jerry was right. It would have been foolish to refuse +a contract because all its clauses were not ideal. + +"You old darling," she said affectionately attaching herself to the +vacant arm once more and giving it a penitent squeeze, "you're quite +right. Of course you are. I can see it now. I was only a little startled +at first. Everything's going to be wonderful. Let's get all our chickens +out and count 'em. How are you going to spend the money?" + +"I know how I'm going to spend a dollar of it," said Gerald completely +restored. + +"I mean the big money. What's a dollar?" + +"It pays for a marriage-licence." + +Sally gave his arm another squeeze. + +"Ladies and gentlemen," she said. "Look at this man. Observe him. My +partner!" + + + + +CHAPTER II. ENTER GINGER + + + +1 + + + +Sally was sitting with her back against a hillock of golden sand, +watching with half-closed eyes the denizens of Roville-sur-Mer at their +familiar morning occupations. At Roville, as at most French seashore +resorts, the morning is the time when the visiting population assembles +in force on the beach. Whiskered fathers of families made cheerful +patches of colour in the foreground. Their female friends and relatives +clustered in groups under gay parasols. Dogs roamed to and fro, and +children dug industriously with spades, ever and anon suspending their +labours in order to smite one another with these handy implements. One +of the dogs, a poodle of military aspect, wandered up to Sally: and +discovering that she was in possession of a box of sweets, decided to +remain and await developments. + +Few things are so pleasant as the anticipation of them, but Sally's +vacation had proved an exception to this rule. It had been a magic month +of lazy happiness. She had drifted luxuriously from one French town to +another, till the charm of Roville, with its blue sky, its Casino, +its snow-white hotels along the Promenade, and its general glitter +and gaiety, had brought her to a halt. Here she could have stayed +indefinitely, but the voice of America was calling her back. Gerald had +written to say that "The Primrose Way" was to be produced in Detroit, +preliminary to its New York run, so soon that, if she wished to see the +opening, she must return at once. A scrappy, hurried, unsatisfactory +letter, the letter of a busy man: but one that Sally could not ignore. +She was leaving Roville to-morrow. + +To-day, however, was to-day: and she sat and watched the bathers with +a familiar feeling of peace, revelling as usual in the still novel +sensation of having nothing to do but bask in the warm sunshine and +listen to the faint murmur of the little waves. + +But, if there was one drawback, she had discovered, to a morning on the +Roville plage, it was that you had a tendency to fall asleep: and this +is a degrading thing to do so soon after breakfast, even if you are on +a holiday. Usually, Sally fought stoutly against the temptation, but +to-day the sun was so warm and the whisper of the waves so insinuating +that she had almost dozed off, when she was aroused by voices close at +hand. There were many voices on the beach, both near and distant, but +these were talking English, a novelty in Roville, and the sound of the +familiar tongue jerked Sally back from the borders of sleep. A few feet +away, two men had seated themselves on the sand. + +From the first moment she had set out on her travels, it had been one of +Sally's principal amusements to examine the strangers whom chance threw +in her way and to try by the light of her intuition to fit them out with +characters and occupations: nor had she been discouraged by an almost +consistent failure to guess right. Out of the corner of her eye she +inspected these two men. + +The first of the pair did not attract her. He was a tall, dark man whose +tight, precise mouth and rather high cheeks bones gave him an appearance +vaguely sinister. He had the dusky look of the clean-shaven man whose +life is a perpetual struggle with a determined beard. He certainly +shaved twice a day, and just as certainly had the self-control not to +swear when he cut himself. She could picture him smiling nastily when +this happened. + +"Hard," diagnosed Sally. "I shouldn't like him. A lawyer or something, I +think." + +She turned to the other and found herself looking into his eyes. This +was because he had been staring at Sally with the utmost intentness ever +since his arrival. His mouth had opened slightly. He had the air of a +man who, after many disappointments, has at last found something worth +looking at. + +"Rather a dear," decided Sally. + +He was a sturdy, thick-set young man with an amiable, freckled face and +the reddest hair Sally had ever seen. He had a square chin, and at one +angle of the chin a slight cut. And Sally was convinced that, however +he had behaved on receipt of that wound, it had not been with superior +self-control. + +"A temper, I should think," she meditated. "Very quick, but soon over. +Not very clever, I should say, but nice." + +She looked away, finding his fascinated gaze a little embarrassing. + +The dark man, who in the objectionably competent fashion which, one +felt, characterized all his actions, had just succeeded in lighting +a cigarette in the teeth of a strong breeze, threw away the match and +resumed the conversation, which had presumably been interrupted by the +process of sitting down. + +"And how is Scrymgeour?" he inquired. + +"Oh, all right," replied the young man with red hair absently. Sally was +looking straight in front of her, but she felt that his eyes were still +busy. + +"I was surprised at his being here. He told me he meant to stay in +Paris." + +There was a slight pause. Sally gave the attentive poodle a piece of +nougat. + +"I say," observed the red-haired young man in clear, penetrating tones +that vibrated with intense feeling, "that's the prettiest girl I've seen +in my life!" + + + +2 + + + +At this frank revelation of the red-haired young man's personal +opinions, Sally, though considerably startled, was not displeased. A +broad-minded girl, the outburst seemed to her a legitimate comment on a +matter of public interest. The young man's companion, on the other hand, +was unmixedly shocked. + +"My dear fellow!" he ejaculated. + +"Oh, it's all right," said the red-haired young man, unmoved. "She can't +understand. There isn't a bally soul in this dashed place that can speak +a word of English. If I didn't happen to remember a few odd bits of +French, I should have starved by this time. That girl," he went on, +returning to the subject most imperatively occupying his mind, "is an +absolute topper! I give you my solemn word I've never seen anybody to +touch her. Look at those hands and feet. You don't get them outside +France. Of course, her mouth is a bit wide," he said reluctantly. + +Sally's immobility, added to the other's assurance concerning the +linguistic deficiencies of the inhabitants of Roville, seemed to +reassure the dark man. He breathed again. At no period of his life +had he ever behaved with anything but the most scrupulous correctness +himself, but he had quailed at the idea of being associated even +remotely with incorrectness in another. It had been a black moment for +him when the red-haired young man had uttered those few kind words. + +"Still you ought to be careful," he said austerely. + +He looked at Sally, who was now dividing her attention between the +poodle and a raffish-looking mongrel, who had joined the party, and +returned to the topic of the mysterious Scrymgeour. + +"How is Scrymgeour's dyspepsia?" + +The red-haired young man seemed but faintly interested in the +vicissitudes of Scrymgeour's interior. + +"Do you notice the way her hair sort of curls over her ears?" he said. +"Eh? Oh, pretty much the same, I think." + +"What hotel are you staying at?" + +"The Normandie." + +Sally, dipping into the box for another chocolate cream, gave an +imperceptible start. She, too, was staying at the Normandie. She +presumed that her admirer was a recent arrival, for she had seen nothing +of him at the hotel. + +"The Normandie?" The dark man looked puzzled. "I know Roville pretty +well by report, but I've never heard of any Hotel Normandie. Where is +it?" + +"It's a little shanty down near the station. Not much of a place. Still, +it's cheap, and the cooking's all right." + +His companion's bewilderment increased. + +"What on earth is a man like Scrymgeour doing there?" he said. Sally +was conscious of an urgent desire to know more and more about the absent +Scrymgeour. Constant repetition of his name had made him seem almost +like an old friend. "If there's one thing he's fussy about..." + +"There are at least eleven thousand things he's fussy about," +interrupted the red-haired young man disapprovingly. "Jumpy old +blighter!" + +"If there's one thing he's particular about, it's the sort of hotel +he goes to. Ever since I've known him he has always wanted the best. I +should have thought he would have gone to the Splendide." He mused on +this problem in a dissatisfied sort of way for a moment, then seemed to +reconcile himself to the fact that a rich man's eccentricities must be +humoured. "I'd like to see him again. Ask him if he will dine with me at +the Splendide to-night. Say eight sharp." + +Sally, occupied with her dogs, whose numbers had now been augmented by +a white terrier with a black patch over its left eye, could not see +the young man's face: but his voice, when he replied, told her that +something was wrong. There was a false airiness in it. + +"Oh, Scrymgeour isn't in Roville." + +"No? Where is he?" + +"Paris, I believe." + +"What!" The dark man's voice sharpened. He sounded as though he were +cross-examining a reluctant witness. "Then why aren't you there? What +are you doing here? Did he give you a holiday?" + +"Yes, he did." + +"When do you rejoin him?" + +"I don't." + +"What!" + +The red-haired young man's manner was not unmistakably dogged. + +"Well, if you want to know," he said, "the old blighter fired me the day +before yesterday." + + + +3 + + + +There was a shuffling of sand as the dark man sprang up. Sally, intent +on the drama which was unfolding itself beside her, absent-mindedly gave +the poodle a piece of nougat which should by rights have gone to the +terrier. She shot a swift glance sideways, and saw the dark man standing +in an attitude rather reminiscent of the stern father of melodrama about +to drive his erring daughter out into the snow. The red-haired young +man, outwardly stolid, was gazing before him down the beach at a fat +bather in an orange suit who, after six false starts, was now actually +in the water, floating with the dignity of a wrecked balloon. + +"Do you mean to tell me," demanded the dark man, "that, after all the +trouble the family took to get you what was practically a sinecure +with endless possibilities if you only behaved yourself, you have +deliberately thrown away..." A despairing gesture completed the +sentence. "Good God, you're hopeless!" + +The red-haired young man made no reply. He continued to gaze down the +beach. Of all outdoor sports, few are more stimulating than watching +middle-aged Frenchmen bathe. Drama, action, suspense, all are here. From +the first stealthy testing of the water with an apprehensive toe to the +final seal-like plunge, there is never a dull moment. And apart from the +excitement of the thing, judging it from a purely aesthetic standpoint, +his must be a dull soul who can fail to be uplifted by the spectacle of +a series of very stout men with whiskers, seen in tight bathing suits +against a background of brightest blue. Yet the young man with red hair, +recently in the employment of Mr. Scrymgeour, eyed this free circus +without any enjoyment whatever. + +"It's maddening! What are you going to do? What do you expect us to do? +Are we to spend our whole lives getting you positions which you won't +keep? I can tell you we're... it's monstrous! It's sickening! Good God!" + +And with these words the dark man, apparently feeling, as Sally had +sometimes felt in the society of her brother Fillmore, the futility of +mere language, turned sharply and stalked away up the beach, the dignity +of his exit somewhat marred a moment later by the fact of his straw hat +blowing off and being trodden on by a passing child. + +He left behind him the sort of electric calm which follows the falling +of a thunderbolt; that stunned calm through which the air seems still to +quiver protestingly. How long this would have lasted one cannot say: +for towards the end of the first minute it was shattered by a purely +terrestrial uproar. With an abruptness heralded only by one short, low +gurgling snarl, there sprang into being the prettiest dog fight that +Roville had seen that season. + +It was the terrier with the black patch who began it. That was Sally's +opinion: and such, one feels, will be the verdict of history. His best +friend, anxious to make out a case for him, could not have denied that +he fired the first gun of the campaign. But we must be just. The fault +was really Sally's. Absorbed in the scene which had just concluded and +acutely inquisitive as to why the shadowy Scrymgeour had seen fit to +dispense with the red-haired young man's services, she had thrice in +succession helped the poodle out of his turn. The third occasion was too +much for the terrier. + +There is about any dog fight a wild, gusty fury which affects the +average mortal with something of the helplessness induced by some vast +clashing of the elements. It seems so outside one's jurisdiction. One is +oppressed with a sense of the futility of interference. And this was no +ordinary dog fight. It was a stunning melee, which would have excited +favourable comment even among the blase residents of a negro quarter or +the not easily-pleased critics of a Lancashire mining-village. From all +over the beach dogs of every size, breed, and colour were racing to the +scene: and while some of these merely remained in the ringside seats +and barked, a considerable proportion immediately started fighting one +another on general principles, well content to be in action without +bothering about first causes. The terrier had got the poodle by the +left hind-leg and was restating his war-aims. The raffish mongrel +was apparently endeavouring to fletcherize a complete stranger of the +Sealyham family. + +Sally was frankly unequal to the situation, as were the entire crowd of +spectators who had come galloping up from the water's edge. She had been +paralysed from the start. Snarling bundles bumped against her legs and +bounced away again, but she made no move. Advice in fluent French rent +the air. Arms waved, and well-filled bathing suits leaped up and down. +But nobody did anything practical until in the centre of the theatre of +war there suddenly appeared the red-haired young man. + +The only reason why dog fights do not go on for ever is that Providence +has decided that on each such occasion there shall always be among those +present one Master Mind; one wizard who, whatever his shortcomings in +other battles of life, is in this single particular sphere competent and +dominating. At Roville-sur-Mer it was the red-haired young man. His dark +companion might have turned from him in disgust: his services might not +have seemed worth retaining by the haughty Scrymgeour: he might be a +pain in the neck to "the family"; but he did know how to stop a dog +fight. From the first moment of his intervention calm began to steal +over the scene. He had the same effect on the almost inextricably +entwined belligerents as, in mediaeval legend, the Holy Grail, sliding +down the sunbeam, used to have on battling knights. He did not look like +a dove of peace, but the most captious could not have denied that he +brought home the goods. There was a magic in his soothing hands, a +spell in his voice: and in a shorter time than one would have believed +possible dog after dog had been sorted out and calmed down; until +presently all that was left of Armageddon was one solitary small Scotch +terrier, thoughtfully licking a chewed leg. The rest of the combatants, +once more in their right mind and wondering what all the fuss was about, +had been captured and haled away in a whirl of recrimination by voluble +owners. + +Having achieved this miracle, the young man turned to Sally. Gallant, +one might say reckless, as he had been a moment before, he now gave +indications of a rather pleasing shyness. He braced himself with that +painful air of effort which announces to the world that an Englishman is +about to speak a language other than his own. + +"J'espere," he said, having swallowed once or twice to brace himself up +for the journey through the jungle of a foreign tongue, "J'espere que +vous n'etes pas--oh, dammit, what's the word--J'espere que vous n'etes +pas blessee?" + +"Blessee?" + +"Yes, blessee. Wounded. Hurt, don't you know. Bitten. Oh, dash it. +J'espere..." + +"Oh, bitten!" said Sally, dimpling. "Oh, no, thanks very much. I wasn't +bitten. And I think it was awfully brave of you to save all our lives." + +The compliment seemed to pass over the young man's head. He stared at +Sally with horrified eyes. Over his amiable face there swept a vivid +blush. His jaw dropped. + +"Oh, my sainted aunt!" he ejaculated. + +Then, as if the situation was too much for him and flight the only +possible solution, he spun round and disappeared at a walk so rapid that +it was almost a run. Sally watched him go and was sorry that he had torn +himself away. She still wanted to know why Scrymgeour had fired him. + + + +4 + + + +Bedtime at Roville is an hour that seems to vary according to one's +proximity to the sea. The gilded palaces along the front keep deplorable +hours, polluting the night air till dawn with indefatigable jazz: but at +the pensions of the economical like the Normandie, early to bed is the +rule. True, Jules, the stout young native who combined the offices of +night-clerk and lift attendant at that establishment, was on duty in the +hall throughout the night, but few of the Normandie's patrons made use +of his services. + +Sally, entering shortly before twelve o'clock on the night of the day +on which the dark man, the red-haired young man, and their friend +Scrymgeour had come into her life, found the little hall dim and silent. +Through the iron cage of the lift a single faint bulb glowed: another, +over the desk in the far corner, illuminated the upper half of Jules, +slumbering in a chair. Jules seemed to Sally to be on duty in some +capacity or other all the time. His work, like women's, was never done. +He was now restoring his tissues with a few winks of much-needed beauty +sleep. Sally, who had been to the Casino to hear the band and afterwards +had strolled on the moonlit promenade, had a guilty sense of intrusion. + +As she stood there, reluctant to break in on Jules' rest--for her +sympathetic heart, always at the disposal of the oppressed, had long +ached for this overworked peon--she was relieved to hear footsteps in +the street outside, followed by the opening of the front door. If Jules +would have had to wake up anyway, she felt her sense of responsibility +lessened. The door, having opened, closed again with a bang. Jules +stirred, gurgled, blinked, and sat up, and Sally, turning, perceived +that the new arrival was the red-haired young man. + +"Oh, good evening," said Sally welcomingly. + +The young man stopped, and shuffled uncomfortably. The morning's +happenings were obviously still green in his memory. He had either not +ceased blushing since their last meeting or he was celebrating their +reunion by beginning to blush again: for his face was a familiar +scarlet. + +"Er--good evening," he said, disentangling his feet, which, in the +embarrassment of the moment, had somehow got coiled up together. + +"Or bon soir, I suppose you would say," murmured Sally. + +The young man acknowledged receipt of this thrust by dropping his hat +and tripping over it as he stooped to pick it up. + +Jules, meanwhile, who had been navigating in a sort of somnambulistic +trance in the neighbourhood of the lift, now threw back the cage with a +rattle. + +"It's a shame to have woken you up," said Sally, commiseratingly, +stepping in. + +Jules did not reply, for the excellent reason that he had not been +woken up. Constant practice enabled him to do this sort of work without +breaking his slumber. His brain, if you could call it that, was working +automatically. He had shut up the gate with a clang and was tugging +sluggishly at the correct rope, so that the lift was going slowly up +instead of retiring down into the basement, but he was not awake. + +Sally and the red-haired young man sat side by side on the small seat, +watching their conductor's efforts. After the first spurt, conversation +had languished. Sally had nothing of immediate interest to say, and her +companion seemed to be one of these strong, silent men you read about. +Only a slight snore from Jules broke the silence. + +At the third floor Sally leaned forward and prodded Jules in the lower +ribs. All through her stay at Roville, she had found in dealing with the +native population that actions spoke louder than words. If she wanted +anything in a restaurant or at a shop, she pointed; and, when she wished +the lift to stop, she prodded the man in charge. It was a system worth a +dozen French conversation books. + +Jules brought the machine to a halt: and it was at this point that +he should have done the one thing connected with his professional +activities which he did really well--the opening, to wit, of the iron +cage. There are ways of doing this. Jules' was the right way. He was +accustomed to do it with a flourish, and generally remarked "V'la!" in +a modest but self-congratulatory voice as though he would have liked +to see another man who could have put through a job like that. Jules' +opinion was that he might not be much to look at, but that he could open +a lift door. + +To-night, however, it seemed as if even this not very exacting feat was +beyond his powers. Instead of inserting his key in the lock, he stood +staring in an attitude of frozen horror. He was a man who took most +things in life pretty seriously, and whatever was the little difficulty +just now seemed to have broken him all up. + +"There appears," said Sally, turning to her companion, "to be a hitch. +Would you mind asking what's the matter? I don't know any French myself +except 'oo la la!'" + +The young man, thus appealed to, nerved himself to the task. He eyed the +melancholy Jules doubtfully, and coughed in a strangled sort of way. + +"Oh, esker... esker vous..." + +"Don't weaken," said Sally. "I think you've got him going." + +"Esker vous... Pourquoi vous ne... I mean ne vous... that is to say, +quel est le raison..." + +He broke off here, because at this point Jules began to explain. He +explained very rapidly and at considerable length. The fact that neither +of his hearers understood a word of what he was saying appeared not +to have impressed itself upon him. Or, if he gave a thought to it, +he dismissed the objection as trifling. He wanted to explain, and he +explained. Words rushed from him like water from a geyser. Sounds which +you felt you would have been able to put a meaning to if he had detached +them from the main body and repeated them slowly, went swirling down the +stream and were lost for ever. + +"Stop him!" said Sally firmly. + +The red-haired young man looked as a native of Johnstown might have +looked on being requested to stop that city's celebrated flood. + +"Stop him?" + +"Yes. Blow a whistle or something." + +Out of the depths of the young man's memory there swam to the surface +a single word--a word which he must have heard somewhere or read +somewhere: a legacy, perhaps, from long-vanished school-days. + +"Zut!" he barked, and instantaneously Jules turned himself off at the +main. There was a moment of dazed silence, such as might occur in a +boiler-factory if the works suddenly shut down. + +"Quick! Now you've got him!" cried Sally. "Ask him what he's talking +about--if he knows, which I doubt--and tell him to speak slowly. Then we +shall get somewhere." + +The young man nodded intelligently. The advice was good. + +"Lentement," he said. "Parlez lentement. Pas si--you know what I +mean--pas si dashed vite!" + +"Ah-a-ah!" cried Jules, catching the idea on the fly. "Lentement. Ah, +oui, lentement." + +There followed a lengthy conversation which, while conveying nothing to +Sally, seemed intelligible to the red-haired linguist. + +"The silly ass," he was able to announce some few minutes later, "has +made a bloomer. Apparently he was half asleep when we came in, and he +shoved us into the lift and slammed the door, forgetting that he had +left the keys on the desk." + +"I see," said Sally. "So we're shut in?" + +"I'm afraid so. I wish to goodness," said the young man, "I knew French +well. I'd curse him with some vim and not a little animation, the chump! +I wonder what 'blighter' is in French," he said, meditating. + +"It's the merest suggestion," said Sally, "but oughtn't we to do +something?" + +"What could we do?" + +"Well, for one thing, we might all utter a loud yell. It would scare +most of the people in the hotel to death, but there might be a survivor +or two who would come and investigate and let us out." + +"What a ripping idea!" said the young man, impressed. + +"I'm glad you like it. Now tell him the main out-line, or he'll think +we've gone mad." + +The young man searched for words, and eventually found some which +expressed his meaning lamely but well enough to cause Jules to nod in a +depressed sort of way. + +"Fine!" said Sally. "Now, all together at the word 'three.' +One--two--Oh, poor darling!" she broke off. "Look at him!" + +In the far corner of the lift, the emotional Jules was sobbing silently +into the bunch of cotton-waste which served him in the office of a +pocket-handkerchief. His broken-hearted gulps echoed hollowly down the +shaft. + + + +5 + + + +In these days of cheap books of instruction on every subject under the +sun, we most of us know how to behave in the majority of life's little +crises. We have only ourselves to blame if we are ignorant of what to +do before the doctor comes, of how to make a dainty winter coat for baby +out of father's last year's under-vest and of the best method of coping +with the cold mutton. But nobody yet has come forward with practical +advice as to the correct method of behaviour to be adopted when +a lift-attendant starts crying. And Sally and her companion, as a +consequence, for a few moments merely stared at each other helplessly. + +"Poor darling!" said Sally, finding speech. "Ask him what's the matter." + +The young man looked at her doubtfully. + +"You know," he said, "I don't enjoy chatting with this blighter. I mean +to say, it's a bit of an effort. I don't know why it is, but talking +French always makes me feel as if my nose were coming off. Couldn't we +just leave him to have his cry out by himself?" + +"The idea!" said Sally. "Have you no heart? Are you one of those fiends +in human shape?" + +He turned reluctantly to Jules, and paused to overhaul his vocabulary. + +"You ought to be thankful for this chance," said Sally. "It's the only +real way of learning French, and you're getting a lesson for nothing. +What did he say then?" + +"Something about losing something, it seemed to me. I thought I caught +the word perdu." + +"But that means a partridge, doesn't it? I'm sure I've seen it on the +menus." + +"Would he talk about partridges at a time like this?" + +"He might. The French are extraordinary people." + +"Well, I'll have another go at him. But he's a difficult chap to chat +with. If you give him the least encouragement, he sort of goes off like +a rocket." He addressed another question to the sufferer, and listened +attentively to the voluble reply. + +"Oh!" he said with sudden enlightenment. "Your job?" He turned to Sally. +"I got it that time," he said. "The trouble is, he says, that if we yell +and rouse the house, we'll get out all right, but he will lose his job, +because this is the second time this sort of thing has happened, and +they warned him last time that once more would mean the push." + +"Then we mustn't dream of yelling," said Sally, decidedly. "It means +a pretty long wait, you know. As far as I can gather, there's just a +chance of somebody else coming in later, in which case he could let +us out. But it's doubtful. He rather thinks that everybody has gone to +roost." + +"Well, we must try it. I wouldn't think of losing the poor man his job. +Tell him to take the car down to the ground-floor, and then we'll just +sit and amuse ourselves till something happens. We've lots to talk +about. We can tell each other the story of our lives." + +Jules, cheered by his victims' kindly forbearance, lowered the car to +the ground floor, where, after a glance of infinite longing at the keys +on the distant desk, the sort of glance which Moses must have cast at +the Promised Land from the summit of Mount Pisgah, he sagged down in a +heap and resumed his slumbers. Sally settled herself as comfortably as +possible in her corner. + +"You'd better smoke," she said. "It will be something to do." + +"Thanks awfully." + +"And now," said Sally, "tell me why Scrymgeour fired you." + +Little by little, under the stimulating influence of this nocturnal +adventure, the red-haired young man had lost that shy confusion which +had rendered him so ill at ease when he had encountered Sally in the +hall of the hotel; but at this question embarrassment gripped him once +more. Another of those comprehensive blushes of his raced over his face, +and he stammered. + +"I say, I'm glad... I'm fearfully sorry about that, you know!" + +"About Scrymgeour?" + +"You know what I mean. I mean, about making such a most ghastly ass of +myself this morning. I... I never dreamed you understood English." + +"Why, I didn't object. I thought you were very nice and complimentary. +Of course, I don't know how many girls you've seen in your life, but..." + +"No, I say, don't! It makes me feel such a chump." + +"And I'm sorry about my mouth. It is wide. But I know you're a +fair-minded man and realize that it isn't my fault." + +"Don't rub it in," pleaded the young man. "As a matter of fact, if you +want to know, I think your mouth is absolutely perfect. I think," he +proceeded, a little feverishly, "that you are the most indescribable +topper that ever..." + +"You were going to tell me about Scrymgeour," said Sally. + +The young man blinked as if he had collided with some hard object while +sleep-walking. Eloquence had carried him away. + +"Scrymgeour?" he said. "Oh, that would bore you." + +"Don't be silly," said Sally reprovingly. "Can't you realize that we're +practically castaways on a desert island? There's nothing to do till +to-morrow but talk about ourselves. I want to hear all about you, +and then I'll tell you all about myself. If you feel diffident about +starting the revelations, I'll begin. Better start with names. Mine is +Sally Nicholas. What's yours?" + +"Mine? Oh, ah, yes, I see what you mean." + +"I thought you would. I put it as clearly as I could. Well, what is it?" + +"Kemp." + +"And the first name?" + +"Well, as a matter of fact," said the young man, "I've always rather +hushed up my first name, because when I was christened they worked a +low-down trick on me!" + +"You can't shock me," said Sally, encouragingly. "My father's name was +Ezekiel, and I've a brother who was christened Fillmore." + +Mr. Kemp brightened. "Well, mine isn't as bad as that... No, I don't +mean that," he broke off apologetically. "Both awfully jolly names, of +course..." + +"Get on," said Sally. + +"Well, they called me Lancelot. And, of course, the thing is that I +don't look like a Lancelot and never shall. My pals," he added in a more +cheerful strain, "call me Ginger." + +"I don't blame them," said Sally. + +"Perhaps you wouldn't mind thinking of me as Ginger?'' suggested the +young man diffidently. + +"Certainly." + +"That's awfully good of you." + +"Not at all." + +Jules stirred in his sleep and grunted. No other sound came to disturb +the stillness of the night. + +"You were going to tell me about yourself?" said Mr. Lancelot (Ginger) +Kemp. + +"I'm going to tell you all about myself," said Sally, "not because I +think it will interest you..." + +"Oh, it will!" + +"Not, I say, because I think it will interest you..." + +"It will, really." + +Sally looked at him coldly. + +"Is this a duet?" she inquired, "or have I the floor?" + +"I'm awfully sorry." + +"Not, I repeat for the third time, because I think It will interest you, +but because if I do you won't have any excuse for not telling me your +life-history, and you wouldn't believe how inquisitive I am. Well, in +the first place, I live in America. I'm over here on a holiday. And it's +the first real holiday I've had in three years--since I left home, in +fact." Sally paused. "I ran away from home," she said. + +"Good egg!" said Ginger Kemp. + +"I beg your pardon?" + +"I mean, quite right. I bet you were quite right." + +"When I say home," Sally went on, "it was only a sort of imitation +home, you know. One of those just-as-good homes which are never as +satisfactory as the real kind. My father and mother both died a good +many years ago. My brother and I were dumped down on the reluctant +doorstep of an uncle." + +"Uncles," said Ginger Kemp, feelingly, "are the devil. I've got an... +but I'm interrupting you." + +"My uncle was our trustee. He had control of all my brother's money +and mine till I was twenty-one. My brother was to get his when he was +twenty-five. My poor father trusted him blindly, and what do you think +happened?" + +"Good Lord! The blighter embezzled the lot?" + +"No, not a cent. Wasn't it extraordinary! Have you ever heard of a +blindly trusted uncle who was perfectly honest? Well, mine was. But the +trouble was that, while an excellent man to have looking after one's +money, he wasn't a very lovable character. He was very hard. Hard! +He was as hard as--well, nearly as hard as this seat. He hated poor +Fill..." + +"Phil?" + +"I broke it to you just now that my brother's name was Fillmore." + +"Oh, your brother. Oh, ah, yes." + +"He was always picking on poor Fill. And I'm bound to say that Fill +rather laid himself out as what you might call a pickee. He was always +getting into trouble. One day, about three years ago, he was expelled +from Harvard, and my uncle vowed he would have nothing more to do with +him. So I said, if Fill left, I would leave. And, as this seemed to be +my uncle's idea of a large evening, no objection was raised, and Fill +and I departed. We went to New York, and there we've been ever since. +About six months' ago Fill passed the twenty-five mark and collected his +money, and last month I marched past the given point and got mine. So it +all ends happily, you see. Now tell me about yourself." + +"But, I say, you know, dash it, you've skipped a lot. I mean to say, you +must have had an awful time in New York, didn't you? How on earth did +you get along?" + +"Oh, we found work. My brother tried one or two things, and finally +became an assistant stage-manager with some theatre people. The only +thing I could do, having been raised in enervating luxury, was ballroom +dancing, so I ball-room danced. I got a job at a place in Broadway +called 'The Flower Garden' as what is humorously called an +'instructress,' as if anybody could 'instruct' the men who came there. +One was lucky if one saved one's life and wasn't quashed to death." + +"How perfectly foul!" + +"Oh, I don't know. It was rather fun for a while. Still," said Sally, +meditatively, "I'm not saying I could have held out much longer: I was +beginning to give. I suppose I've been trampled underfoot by more fat +men than any other girl of my age in America. I don't know why it was, +but every man who came in who was a bit overweight seemed to make for me +by instinct. That's why I like to sit on the sands here and watch +these Frenchmen bathing. It's just heavenly to lie back and watch a two +hundred and fifty pound man, coming along and feel that he isn't going +to dance with me." + +"But, I say! How absolutely rotten it must have been for you!" + +"Well, I'll tell you one thing. It's going to make me a very +domesticated wife one of these days. You won't find me gadding about in +gilded jazz-palaces! For me, a little place in the country somewhere, +with my knitting and an Elsie book, and bed at half-past nine! And now +tell me the story of your life. And make it long because I'm perfectly +certain there's going to be no relief-expedition. I'm sure the last +dweller under this roof came in years ago. We shall be here till +morning." + +"I really think we had better shout, you know." + +"And lose Jules his job? Never!" + +"Well, of course, I'm sorry for poor old Jules' troubles, but I hate to +think of you having to..." + +"Now get on with the story," said Sally. + + + +6 + + + +Ginger Kemp exhibited some of the symptoms of a young bridegroom called +upon at a wedding-breakfast to respond to the toast. He moved his feet +restlessly and twisted his fingers. + +"I hate talking about myself, you know," he said. + +"So I supposed," said Sally. "That's why I gave you my autobiography +first, to give you no chance of backing out. Don't be such a shrinking +violet. We're all shipwrecked mariners here. I am intensely interested +in your narrative. And, even if I wasn't, I'd much rather listen to it +than to Jules' snoring." + +"He is snoring a bit, what? Does it annoy you? Shall I stir him?" + +"You seem to have an extraordinary brutal streak in your nature," said +Sally. "You appear to think of nothing else but schemes for harassing +poor Jules. Leave him alone for a second, and start telling me about +yourself." + +"Where shall I start?" + +"Well, not with your childhood, I think. We'll skip that." + +"Well..." Ginger Kemp knitted his brow, searching for a dramatic +opening. "Well, I'm more or less what you might call an orphan, like +you. I mean to say, both my people are dead and all that sort of thing." + +"Thanks for explaining. That has made it quite clear." + +"I can't remember my mother. My father died when I was in my last +year at Cambridge. I'd been having a most awfully good time at the +'varsity,'" said Ginger, warming to his theme. "Not thick, you know, but +good. I'd got my rugger and boxing blues and I'd just been picked for +scrum-half for England against the North in the first trial match, and +between ourselves it really did look as if I was more or less of a snip +for my international." + +Sally gazed at him wide eyed. + +"Is that good or bad?" she asked. + +"Eh?" + +"Are you reciting a catalogue of your crimes, or do you expect me to get +up and cheer? What is a rugger blue, to start with?" + +"Well, it's... it's a rugger blue, you know." + +"Oh, I see," said Sally. "You mean a rugger blue." + +"I mean to say, I played rugger--footer--that's to say, football--Rugby +football--for Cambridge, against Oxford. I was scrum-half." + +"And what is a scrum-half?" asked Sally, patiently. "Yes, I know you're +going to say it's a scrum-half, but can't you make it easier?" + +"The scrum-half," said Ginger, "is the half who works the scrum. He +slings the pill out to the fly-half, who starts the three-quarters +going. I don't know if you understand?" + +"I don't." + +"It's dashed hard to explain," said Ginger Kemp, unhappily. "I mean, +I don't think I've ever met anyone before who didn't know what a +scrum-half was." + +"Well, I can see that it has something to do with football, so we'll +leave it at that. I suppose it's something like our quarter-back. And +what's an international?" + +"It's called getting your international when you play for England, you +know. England plays Wales, France, Ireland, and Scotland. If it hadn't +been for the smash, I think I should have played for England against +Wales." + +"I see at last. What you're trying to tell me is that you were very good +at football." + +Ginger Kemp blushed warmly. + +"Oh, I don't say that. England was pretty short of scrum-halves that +year." + +"What a horrible thing to happen to a country! Still, you were likely +to be picked on the All-England team when the smash came? What was the +smash?" + +"Well, it turned out that the poor old pater hadn't left a penny. I +never understood the process exactly, but I'd always supposed that we +were pretty well off; and then it turned out that I hadn't anything at +all. I'm bound to say it was a bit of a jar. I had to come down from +Cambridge and go to work in my uncle's office. Of course, I made an +absolute hash of it." + +"Why, of course?" + +"Well, I'm not a very clever sort of chap, you see. I somehow didn't +seem able to grasp the workings. After about a year, my uncle, getting +a bit fed-up, hoofed me out and got me a mastership at a school, and I +made a hash of that. He got me one or two other jobs, and I made a hash +of those." + +"You certainly do seem to be one of our most prominent young hashers!" +gasped Sally. + +"I am," said Ginger, modestly. + +There was a silence. + +"And what about Scrymgeour?" Sally asked. + +"That was the last of the jobs," said Ginger. "Scrymgeour is a pompous +old ass who thinks he's going to be Prime Minister some day. He's a big +bug at the Bar and has just got into Parliament. My cousin used to devil +for him. That's how I got mixed up with the blighter." + +"Your cousin used...? I wish you would talk English." + +"That was my cousin who was with me on the beach this morning." + +"And what did you say he used to do for Mr. Scrymgeour?" + +"Oh, it's called devilling. My cousin's at the Bar, too--one of our +rising nibs, as a matter of fact..." + +"I thought he was a lawyer of some kind." + +"He's got a long way beyond it now, but when he started he used to devil +for Scrymgeour--assist him, don't you know. His name's Carmyle, you +know. Perhaps you've heard of him? He's rather a prominent johnny in his +way. Bruce Carmyle, you know." + +"I haven't." + +"Well, he got me this job of secretary to Scrymgeour." + +"And why did Mr. Scrymgeour fire you?" + +Ginger Kemp's face darkened. He frowned. Sally, watching him, felt that +she had been right when she had guessed that he had a temper. She liked +him none the worse for it. Mild men did not appeal to her. + +"I don't know if you're fond of dogs?" said Ginger. + +"I used to be before this morning," said Sally. "And I suppose I shall +be again in time. For the moment I've had what you might call rather a +surfeit of dogs. But aren't you straying from the point? I asked you why +Mr. Scrymgeour dismissed you." + +"I'm telling you." + +"I'm glad of that. I didn't know." + +"The old brute," said Ginger, frowning again, "has a dog. A very jolly +little spaniel. Great pal of mine. And Scrymgeour is the sort of fool +who oughtn't to be allowed to own a dog. He's one of those asses who +isn't fit to own a dog. As a matter of fact, of all the blighted, +pompous, bullying, shrivelled-souled old devils..." + +"One moment," said Sally. "I'm getting an impression that you don't like +Mr. Scrymgeour. Am I right?" + +"Yes!" + +"I thought so. Womanly intuition! Go on." + +"He used to insist on the poor animal doing tricks. I hate seeing a +dog do tricks. Dogs loathe it, you know. They're frightfully sensitive. +Well, Scrymgeour used to make this spaniel of his do tricks--fool-things +that no self-respecting dogs would do: and eventually poor old Billy got +fed up and jibbed. He was too polite to bite, but he sort of shook his +head and crawled under a chair. You'd have thought anyone would have +let it go at that, but would old Scrymgeour? Not a bit of it! Of all the +poisonous..." + +"Yes, I know. Go on." + +"Well, the thing ended in the blighter hauling him out from under the +chair and getting more and more shirty, until finally he laid into him +with a stick. That is to say," said Ginger, coldly accurate, "he started +laying into him with a stick." He brooded for a moment with knit brows. +"A spaniel, mind you! Can you imagine anyone beating a spaniel? It's +like hitting a little girl. Well, he's a fairly oldish man, you know, +and that hampered me a bit: but I got hold of the stick and broke it +into about eleven pieces, and by great good luck it was a stick he +happened to value rather highly. It had a gold knob and had been +presented to him by his constituents or something. I minced it up +a goodish bit, and then I told him a fair amount about himself. And +then--well, after that he shot me out, and I came here." + +Sally did not speak for a moment. + +"You were quite right," she said at last, in a sober voice that had +nothing in it of her customary flippancy. She paused again. "And what +are you going to do now?" she said. + +"I don't know." + +"You'll get something?" + +"Oh, yes, I shall get something, I suppose. The family will be pretty +sick, of course." + +"For goodness' sake! Why do you bother about the family?" Sally burst +out. She could not reconcile this young man's flabby dependence on his +family with the enterprise and vigour which he had shown in his dealings +with the unspeakable Scrymgeour. Of course, he had been brought up to +look on himself as a rich man's son and appeared to have drifted as such +young men are wont to do; but even so... "The whole trouble with you," +she said, embarking on a subject on which she held strong views, "is +that..." + +Her harangue was interrupted by what--at the Normandie, at one o'clock +in the morning--practically amounted to a miracle. The front door of +the hotel opened, and there entered a young man in evening dress. +Such persons were sufficiently rare at the Normandie, which catered +principally for the staid and middle-aged, and this youth's presence was +due, if one must pause to explain it, to the fact that, in the middle +of his stay at Roville, a disastrous evening at the Casino had so +diminished his funds that he had been obliged to make a hurried shift +from the Hotel Splendide to the humbler Normandie. His late appearance +to-night was caused by the fact that he had been attending a dance +at the Splendide, principally in the hope of finding there some +kind-hearted friend of his prosperity from whom he might borrow. + +A rapid-fire dialogue having taken place between Jules and the newcomer, +the keys were handed through the cage, the door opened and the lift was +set once more in motion. And a few minutes later, Sally, suddenly aware +of an overpowering sleepiness, had switched off her light and jumped +into bed. Her last waking thought was a regret that she had not been +able to speak at length to Mr. Ginger Kemp on the subject of enterprise, +and resolve that the address should be delivered at the earliest +opportunity. + + + + +CHAPTER III. THE DIGNIFIED MR. CARMYLE + + + +1 + + + +By six o'clock on the following evening, however, Sally had been forced +to the conclusion that Ginger would have to struggle through life as +best he could without the assistance of her contemplated remarks: for +she had seen nothing of him all day and in another hour she would have +left Roville on the seven-fifteen express which was to take her to +Paris, en route for Cherbourg and the liner whereon she had booked her +passage for New York. + +It was in the faint hope of finding him even now that, at half-past six, +having conveyed her baggage to the station and left it in charge of +an amiable porter, she paid a last visit to the Casino Municipale. She +disliked the thought of leaving Ginger without having uplifted him. Like +so many alert and active-minded girls, she possessed in a great degree +the quality of interesting herself in--or, as her brother Fillmore +preferred to put it, messing about with--the private affairs of others. +Ginger had impressed her as a man to whom it was worth while to give a +friendly shove on the right path; and it was with much gratification, +therefore, that, having entered the Casino, she perceived a flaming +head shining through the crowd which had gathered at one of the +roulette-tables. + +There are two Casinos at Roville-sur-Mer. The one on the Promenade goes +in mostly for sea-air and a mild game called boule. It is the big Casino +Municipale down in the Palace Massena near the railway station which is +the haunt of the earnest gambler who means business; and it was plain to +Sally directly she arrived that Ginger Kemp not only meant business +but was getting results. Ginger was going extremely strong. He was +entrenched behind an opulent-looking mound of square counters: and, even +as Sally looked, a wooden-faced croupier shoved a further instalment +across the table to him at the end of his long rake. + +"Epatant!" murmured a wistful man at Sally's side, removing an elbow +from her ribs in order the better to gesticulate. Sally, though no French +scholar, gathered that he was startled and gratified. The entire crowd +seemed to be startled and gratified. There is undoubtedly a +certain altruism in the make-up of the spectators at a Continental +roulette-table. They seem to derive a spiritual pleasure from seeing +somebody else win. + +The croupier gave his moustache a twist with his left hand and the wheel +a twist with his right, and silence fell again. Sally, who had shifted +to a spot where the pressure of the crowd was less acute, was now able +to see Ginger's face, and as she saw it she gave an involuntary laugh. +He looked exactly like a dog at a rat-hole. His hair seemed to bristle +with excitement. One could almost fancy that his ears were pricked up. + +In the tense hush which had fallen on the crowd at the restarting of the +wheel, Sally's laugh rang out with an embarrassing clearness. It had a +marked effect on all those within hearing. There is something almost of +religious ecstasy in the deportment of the spectators at a table where +anyone is having a run of luck at roulette, and if she had guffawed in +a cathedral she could not have caused a more pained consternation. The +earnest worshippers gazed at her with shocked eyes, and Ginger, turning +with a start, saw her and jumped up. As he did so, the ball fell with a +rattling click into a red compartment of the wheel; and, as it ceased to +revolve and it was seen that at last the big winner had picked the wrong +colour, a shuddering groan ran through the congregation like that which +convulses the penitents' bench at a negro revival meeting. More +glances of reproach were cast at Sally. It was generally felt that her +injudicious behaviour had changed Ginger's luck. + +The only person who did not appear to be concerned was Ginger himself. +He gathered up his loot, thrust it into his pocket, and elbowed his +way to where Sally stood, now definitely established in the eyes of the +crowd as a pariah. There was universal regret that he had decided to +call it a day. It was to the spectators as though a star had suddenly +walked off the stage in the middle of his big scene; and not even a loud +and violent quarrel which sprang up at this moment between two excitable +gamblers over a disputed five-franc counter could wholly console them. + +"I say," said Ginger, dexterously plucking Sally out of the crowd, +"this is topping, meeting you like this. I've been looking for you +everywhere." + +"It's funny you didn't find me, then, for that's where I've been. I was +looking for you." + +"No, really?" Ginger seemed pleased. He led the way to the quiet +ante-room outside the gambling-hall, and they sat down in a corner. +It was pleasant here, with nobody near except the gorgeously uniformed +attendant over by the door. "That was awfully good of you." + +"I felt I must have a talk with you before my train went." + +Ginger started violently. + +"Your train? What do you mean?" + +"The puff-puff," explained Sally. "I'm leaving to-night, you know." + +"Leaving?" Ginger looked as horrified as the devoutest of the +congregation of which Sally had just ceased to be a member. "You don't +mean leaving? You're not going away from Roville?" + +"I'm afraid so." + +"But why? Where are you going?" + +"Back to America. My boat sails from Cherbourg tomorrow." + +"Oh, my aunt!" + +"I'm sorry," said Sally, touched by his concern. She was a warm-hearted +girl and liked being appreciated. "But..." + +"I say..." Ginger Kemp turned bright scarlet and glared before him at +the uniformed official, who was regarding their tete-a-tete with the +indulgent eye of one who has been through this sort of thing himself. "I +say, look here, will you marry me?" + + + +2 + + + +Sally stared at his vermilion profile in frank amazement. Ginger, she +had realized by this time, was in many ways a surprising young man, but +she had not expected him to be as surprising as this. + +"Marry you!" + +"You know what I mean." + +"Well, yes, I suppose I do. You allude to the holy state. Yes, I know +what you mean." + +"Then how about it?" + +Sally began to regain her composure. Her sense of humour was tickled. +She looked at Ginger gravely. He did not meet her eye, but continued to +drink in the uniformed official, who was by now so carried away by +the romance of it all that he had begun to hum a love-ballad under his +breath. The official could not hear what they were saying, and would not +have been able to understand it even if he could have heard; but he was +an expert in the language of the eyes. + +"But isn't this--don't think I am trying to make difficulties--isn't +this a little sudden?" + +"It's got to be sudden," said Ginger Kemp, complainingly. "I thought you +were going to be here for weeks." + +"But, my infant, my babe, has it occurred to you that we are practically +strangers?" She patted his hand tolerantly, causing the uniformed +official to heave a tender sigh. "I see what has happened," she said. +"You're mistaking me for some other girl, some girl you know really +well, and were properly introduced to. Take a good look at me, and +you'll see." + +"If I take a good look at you," said Ginger, feverishly, "I'm dashed if +I'll answer for the consequences." + +"And this is the man I was going to lecture on 'Enterprise.'" + +"You're the most wonderful girl I've ever met, dash it!" said Ginger, +his gaze still riveted on the official by the door "I dare say it is +sudden. I can't help that. I fell in love with you the moment I saw you, +and there you are!" + +"But..." + +"Now, look here, I know I'm not much of a chap and all that, but... +well, I've just won the deuce of a lot of money in there..." + +"Would you buy me with your gold?" + +"I mean to say, we should have enough to start on, and... of course I've +made an infernal hash of everything I've tried up till now, but there +must be something I can do, and you can jolly well bet I'd have a +goodish stab at it. I mean to say, with you to buck me up and so forth, +don't you know. Well, I mean..." + +"Has it struck you that I may already be engaged to someone else?" + +"Oh, golly! Are you?" + +For the first time he turned and faced her, and there was a look in his +eyes which touched Sally and drove all sense of the ludicrous out of +her. Absurd as it was, this man was really serious. + +"Well, yes, as a matter of fact I am," she said soberly. + +Ginger Kemp bit his lip and for a moment was silent. + +"Oh, well, that's torn it!" he said at last. + +Sally was aware of an emotion too complex to analyse. There was pity in +it, but amusement too. The emotion, though she did not recognize it, was +maternal. Mothers, listening to their children pleading with engaging +absurdity for something wholly out of their power to bestow, feel that +same wavering between tears and laughter. Sally wanted to pick Ginger up +and kiss him. The one thing she could not do was to look on him, sorry +as she was for him, as a reasonable, grown-up man. + +"You don't really mean it, you know." + +"Don't I!" said Ginger, hollowly. "Oh, don't I!" + +"You can't! There isn't such a thing in real life as love at first +sight. Love's a thing that comes when you know a person well and..." +She paused. It had just occurred to her that she was hardly the girl to +lecture in this strain. Her love for Gerald Foster had been sufficiently +sudden, even instantaneous. What did she know of Gerald except that +she loved him? They had become engaged within two weeks of their first +meeting. She found this recollection damping to her eloquence, and ended +by saying tamely: + +"It's ridiculous." + +Ginger had simmered down to a mood of melancholy resignation. + +"I couldn't have expected you to care for me, I suppose, anyway," he +said, sombrely. "I'm not much of a chap." + +It was just the diversion from the theme under discussion which Sally +had been longing to find. She welcomed the chance of continuing the +conversation on a less intimate and sentimental note. + +"That's exactly what I wanted to talk to you about," she said, seizing +the opportunity offered by this display of humility. "I've been looking +for you all day to go on with what I was starting to say in the lift +last night when we were interrupted. Do you mind if I talk to you like +an aunt--or a sister, suppose we say? Really, the best plan would be for +you to adopt me as an honorary sister. What do you think?" + +Ginger did not appear noticeably elated at the suggested relationship. + +"Because I really do take a tremendous interest in you." + +Ginger brightened. "That's awfully good of you." + +"I'm going to speak words of wisdom. Ginger, why don't you brace up?" + +"Brace up?" + +"Yes, stiffen your backbone and stick out your chin, and square your +elbows, and really amount to something. Why do you simply flop about and +do nothing and leave everything to what you call 'the family'? Why do +you have to be helped all the time? Why don't you help yourself? Why do +you have to have jobs found for you? Why don't you rush out and get one? +Why do you have to worry about what, 'the family' thinks of you? Why +don't you make yourself independent of them? I know you had hard luck, +suddenly finding yourself without money and all that, but, good heavens, +everybody else in the world who has ever done anything has been broke at +one time or another. It's part of the fun. You'll never get anywhere +by letting yourself be picked up by the family like... like a floppy +Newfoundland puppy and dumped down in any old place that happens to +suit them. A job's a thing you've got to choose for yourself and get for +yourself. Think what you can do--there must be something--and then go +at it with a snort and grab it and hold it down and teach it to take +a joke. You've managed to collect some money. It will give you time +to look round. And, when you've had a look round, do something! Try to +realize you're alive, and try to imagine the family isn't!" + +Sally stopped and drew a deep breath. Ginger Kemp did not reply for a +moment. He seemed greatly impressed. + +"When you talk quick," he said at length, in a serious meditative voice, +"your nose sort of goes all squiggly. Ripping, it looks!" + +Sally uttered an indignant cry. + +"Do you mean to say you haven't been listening to a word I've been +saying," she demanded. + +"Oh, rather! Oh, by Jove, yes." + +"Well, what did I say?" + +"You... er... And your eyes sort of shine, too." + +"Never mind my eyes. What did I say?" + +"You told me," said Ginger, on reflection, "to get a job." + +"Well, yes. I put it much better than that, but that's what it amounted +to, I suppose. All right, then. I'm glad you..." + +Ginger was eyeing her with mournful devotion. "I say," he interrupted, +"I wish you'd let me write to you. Letters, I mean, and all that. I have +an idea it would kind of buck me up." + +"You won't have time for writing letters." + +"I'll have time to write them to you. You haven't an address or anything +of that sort in America, have you, by any chance? I mean, so that I'd +know where to write to." + +"I can give you an address which will always find me." She told him the +number and street of Mrs. Meecher's boarding-house, and he wrote them +down reverently on his shirt-cuff. "Yes, on second thoughts, do write," +she said. "Of course, I shall want to know how you've got on. I... oh, +my goodness! That clock's not right?" + +"Just about. What time does your train go?" + +"Go! It's gone! Or, at least, it goes in about two seconds." She made a +rush for the swing-door, to the confusion of the uniformed official who +had not been expecting this sudden activity. "Good-bye, Ginger. Write to +me, and remember what I said." + +Ginger, alert after his unexpected fashion when it became a question +of physical action, had followed her through the swing-door, and they +emerged together and started running down the square. + +"Stick it!" said Ginger, encouragingly. He was running easily and well, +as becomes a man who, in his day, had been a snip for his international +at scrum-half. + +Sally saved her breath. The train was beginning to move slowly out of +the station as they sprinted abreast on to the platform. Ginger dived +for the nearest door, wrenched it open, gathered Sally neatly in his +arms, and flung her in. She landed squarely on the toes of a man who +occupied the corner seat, and, bounding off again, made for the window. +Ginger, faithful to the last, was trotting beside the train as it +gathered speed. + +"Ginger! My poor porter! Tip him. I forgot." + +"Right ho!" + +"And don't forget what I've been saying." + +"Right ho!" + +"Look after yourself and 'Death to the Family!'" + +"Right ho!" + +The train passed smoothly out of the station. Sally cast one last look +back at her red-haired friend, who had now halted and was waving a +handkerchief. Then she turned to apologize to the other occupant of the +carriage. + +"I'm so sorry," she said, breathlessly. "I hope I didn't hurt you." + +She found herself facing Ginger's cousin, the dark man of yesterday's +episode on the beach, Bruce Carmyle. + + + +3 + + + +Mr. Carmyle was not a man who readily allowed himself to be disturbed +by life's little surprises, but at the present moment he could not help +feeling slightly dazed. He recognized Sally now as the French girl who +had attracted his cousin Lancelot's notice on the beach. At least he had +assumed that she was French, and it was startling to be addressed by +her now in fluent English. How had she suddenly acquired this gift of +tongues? And how on earth had she had time since yesterday, when he +had been a total stranger to her, to become sufficiently intimate with +Cousin Lancelot to be sprinting with him down station platforms and +addressing him out of railway-carriage windows as Ginger? Bruce Carmyle +was aware that most members of that sub-species of humanity, his +cousin's personal friends, called him by that familiar--and, so Carmyle +held, vulgar--nickname: but how had this girl got hold of it? + +If Sally had been less pretty, Mr. Carmyle would undoubtedly have looked +disapprovingly at her, for she had given his rather rigid sense of the +proprieties a nasty jar. But as, panting and flushed from her run, she +was prettier than any girl he had yet met, he contrived to smile. + +"Not at all," he said in answer to her question, though it was far from +the truth. His left big toe was aching confoundedly. Even a girl with +a foot as small as Sally's can make her presence felt on a man's toe if +the scrum-half who is handling her aims well and uses plenty of vigour. + +"If you don't mind," said Sally, sitting down, "I think I'll breathe a +little." + +She breathed. The train sped on. + +"Quite a close thing," said Bruce Carmyle, affably. The pain in his toe +was diminishing. "You nearly missed it." + +"Yes. It was lucky Mr. Kemp was with me. He throws very straight, +doesn't he." + +"Tell me," said Carmyle, "how do you come to know my Cousin? On the +beach yesterday morning..." + +"Oh, we didn't know each other then. But we were staying at the same +hotel, and we spent an hour or so shut up in an elevator together. That +was when we really got acquainted." + +A waiter entered the compartment, announcing in unexpected English that +dinner was served in the restaurant car. "Would you care for dinner?" + +"I'm starving," said Sally. + +She reproved herself, as they made their way down the corridor, for +being so foolish as to judge anyone by his appearance. This man was +perfectly pleasant in spite of his grim exterior. She had decided by the +time they had seated themselves at the table she liked him. + +At the table, however, Mr. Carmyle's manner changed for the worse. He +lost his amiability. He was evidently a man who took his meals seriously +and believed in treating waiters with severity. He shuddered austerely +at a stain on the table-cloth, and then concentrated himself frowningly +on the bill of fare. Sally, meanwhile, was establishing cosy relations +with the much too friendly waiter, a cheerful old man who from the start +seemed to have made up his mind to regard her as a favourite daughter. +The waiter talked no English and Sally no French, but they were getting +along capitally, when Mr. Carmyle, who had been irritably waving aside +the servitor's light-hearted advice--at the Hotel Splendide the waiters +never bent over you and breathed cordial suggestions down the side of +your face--gave his order crisply in the Anglo-Gallic dialect of the +travelling Briton. The waiter remarked, "Boum!" in a pleased sort of +way, and vanished. + +"Nice old man!" said Sally. + +"Infernally familiar!" said Mr. Carmyle. + +Sally perceived that on the topic of the waiter she and her host did not +see eye to eye and that little pleasure or profit could be derived from +any discussion centring about him. She changed the subject. She was not +liking Mr. Carmyle quite so much as she had done a few minutes ago, but +it was courteous of him to give her dinner, and she tried to like him as +much as she could. + +"By the way," she said, "my name is Nicholas. I always think it's a good +thing to start with names, don't you?" + +"Mine..." + +"Oh, I know yours. Ginger--Mr. Kemp told me." + +Mr. Carmyle, who since the waiter's departure, had been thawing, +stiffened again at the mention of Ginger. + +"Indeed?" he said, coldly. "Apparently you got intimate." + +Sally did not like his tone. He seemed to be criticizing her, and she +resented criticism from a stranger. Her eyes opened wide and she looked +dangerously across the table. + +"Why 'apparently'? I told you that we had got intimate, and I explained +how. You can't stay shut up in an elevator half the night with anybody +without getting to know him. I found Mr. Kemp very pleasant." + +"Really?" + +"And very interesting." + +Mr. Carmyle raised his eyebrows. + +"Would you call him interesting?" + +"I did call him interesting." Sally was beginning to feel the +exhilaration of battle. Men usually made themselves extremely agreeable +to her, and she reacted belligerently under the stiff unfriendliness +which had come over her companion in the last few minutes. + +"He told me all about himself." + +"And you found that interesting?" + +"Why not?" + +"Well..." A frigid half-smile came and went on Bruce Carmyle's dark +face. "My cousin has many excellent qualities, no doubt--he used to +play football well, and I understand that he is a capable amateur +pugilist--but I should not have supposed him entertaining. We find him a +little dull." + +"I thought it was only royalty that called themselves 'we.'" + +"I meant myself--and the rest of the family." + +The mention of the family was too much for Sally. She had to stop +talking in order to allow her mind to clear itself of rude thoughts. + +"Mr. Kemp was telling me about Mr. Scrymgeour," she went on at length. + +Bruce Carmyle stared for a moment at the yard or so of French bread +which the waiter had placed on the table. + +"Indeed?" he said. "He has an engaging lack of reticence." + +The waiter returned bearing soup and dumped it down. + +"V'la!" he observed, with the satisfied air of a man who has +successfully performed a difficult conjuring trick. He smiled at Sally +expectantly, as though confident of applause from this section of his +audience at least. But Sally's face was set and rigid. She had been +snubbed, and the sensation was as pleasant as it was novel. + +"I think Mr. Kemp had hard luck," she said. + +"If you will excuse me, I would prefer not to discuss the matter." + +Mr. Carmyle's attitude was that Sally might be a pretty girl, but she +was a stranger, and the intimate affairs of the Family were not to be +discussed with strangers, however prepossessing. + +"He was quite in the right. Mr. Scrymgeour was beating a dog..." + +"I've heard the details." + +"Oh, I didn't know that. Well, don't you agree with me, then?" + +"I do not. A man who would throw away an excellent position simply +because..." + +"Oh, well, if that's your view, I suppose it is useless to talk about +it." + +"Quite." + +"Still, there's no harm in asking what you propose to do about +Gin--about Mr. Kemp." + +Mr. Carmyle became more glacial. + +"I'm afraid I cannot discuss..." + +Sally's quick impatience, nobly restrained till now, finally got the +better of her. + +"Oh, for goodness' sake," she snapped, "do try to be human, and don't +always be snubbing people. You remind me of one of those portraits of +men in the eighteenth century, with wooden faces, who look out of +heavy gold frames at you with fishy eyes as if you were a regrettable +incident." + +"Rosbif," said the waiter genially, manifesting himself suddenly beside +them as if he had popped up out of a trap. + +Bruce Carmyle attacked his roast beef morosely. Sally who was in the +mood when she knew that she would be ashamed of herself later on, but +was full of battle at the moment, sat in silence. + +"I am sorry," said Mr. Carmyle ponderously, "if my eyes are fishy. The +fact has not been called to my attention before." + +"I suppose you never had any sisters," said Sally. "They would have told +you." + +Mr. Carmyle relapsed into an offended dumbness, which lasted till the +waiter had brought the coffee. + +"I think," said Sally, getting up, "I'll be going now. I don't seem to +want any coffee, and, if I stay on, I may say something rude. I thought +I might be able to put in a good word for Mr. Kemp and save him from +being massacred, but apparently it's no use. Good-bye, Mr. Carmyle, and +thank you for giving me dinner." + +She made her way down the car, followed by Bruce Carmyle's indignant, +yet fascinated, gaze. Strange emotions were stirring in Mr. Carmyle's +bosom. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. GINGER IN DANGEROUS MOOD + + + +Some few days later, owing to the fact that the latter, being +preoccupied, did not see him first, Bruce Carmyle met his cousin +Lancelot in Piccadilly. They had returned by different routes from +Roville, and Ginger would have preferred the separation to continue. He +was hurrying on with a nod, when Carmyle stopped him. + +"Just the man I wanted to see," he observed. + +"Oh, hullo!" said Ginger, without joy. + +"I was thinking of calling at your club." + +"Yes?" + +"Yes. Cigarette?" + +Ginger peered at the proffered case with the vague suspicion of the man +who has allowed himself to be lured on to the platform and is accepting +a card from the conjurer. He felt bewildered. In all the years of their +acquaintance he could not recall another such exhibition of geniality on +his cousin's part. He was surprised, indeed, at Mr. Carmyle's speaking +to him at all, for the affaire Scrymgeour remained an un-healed wound, +and the Family, Ginger knew, were even now in session upon it. + +"Been back in London long?" + +"Day or two." + +"I heard quite by accident that you had returned and that you were +staying at the club. By the way, thank you for introducing me to Miss +Nicholas." + +Ginger started violently. + +"What!" + +"I was in that compartment, you know, at Roville Station. You threw +her right on top of me. We agreed to consider that an introduction. An +attractive girl." + +Bruce Carmyle had not entirely made up his mind regarding Sally, but on +one point he was clear, that she should not, if he could help it, pass +out of his life. Her abrupt departure had left him with that baffled and +dissatisfied feeling which, though it has little in common with love at +first sight, frequently produces the same effects. She had had, he could +not disguise it from himself, the better of their late encounter and he +was conscious of a desire to meet her again and show her that there was +more in him than she apparently supposed. Bruce Carmyle, in a word, +was piqued: and, though he could not quite decide whether he liked or +disliked Sally, he was very sure that a future without her would have an +element of flatness. + +"A very attractive girl. We had a very pleasant talk." + +"I bet you did," said Ginger enviously. + +"By the way, she did not give you her address by any chance?" + +"Why?" said Ginger suspiciously. His attitude towards Sally's address +resembled somewhat that of a connoisseur who has acquired a unique work +of art. He wanted to keep it to himself and gloat over it. + +"Well, I--er--I promised to send her some books she was anxious to +read..." + +"I shouldn't think she gets much time for reading." + +"Books which are not published in America." + +"Oh, pretty nearly everything is published in America, what? Bound to +be, I mean." + +"Well, these particular books are not," said Mr. Carmyle shortly. He was +finding Ginger's reserve a little trying, and wished that he had been +more inventive. + +"Give them to me and I'll send them to her," suggested Ginger. + +"Good Lord, man!" snapped Mr. Carmyle. "I'm capable of sending a few +books to America. Where does she live?" + +Ginger revealed the sacred number of the holy street which had the luck +to be Sally's headquarters. He did it because with a persistent devil +like his cousin there seemed no way of getting out of it: but he did it +grudgingly. + +"Thanks." Bruce Carmyle wrote the information down with a gold pencil +in a dapper little morocco-bound note-book. He was the sort of man who +always has a pencil, and the backs of old envelopes never enter into his +life. + +There was a pause. Bruce Carmyle coughed. + +"I saw Uncle Donald this morning," he said. + +His manner had lost its geniality. There was no need for it now, and he +was a man who objected to waste. He spoke coldly, and in his voice there +was a familiar sub-tingle of reproof. + +"Yes?" said Ginger moodily. This was the uncle in whose office he +had made his debut as a hasher: a worthy man, highly respected in the +National Liberal Club, but never a favourite of Ginger's. There were +other minor uncles and a few subsidiary aunts who went to make up the +Family, but Uncle Donald was unquestionably the managing director of +that body and it was Ginger's considered opinion that in this capacity +he approximated to a human blister. + +"He wants you to dine with him to-night at Bleke's." + +Ginger's depression deepened. A dinner with Uncle Donald would hardly +have been a cheerful function, even in the surroundings of a banquet +in the Arabian Nights. There was that about Uncle Donald's personality +which would have cast a sobering influence over the orgies of the +Emperor Tiberius at Capri. To dine with him at a morgue like that +relic of Old London, Bleke's Coffee House, which confined its custom +principally to regular patrons who had not missed an evening there for +half a century, was to touch something very near bed-rock. Ginger was +extremely doubtful whether flesh and blood were equal to it. + +"To-night?" he said. "Oh, you mean to-night? Well..." + +"Don't be a fool. You know as well as I do that you've got to go." +Uncle Donald's invitations were royal commands in the Family. "If you've +another engagement you must put it off." + +"Oh, all right." + +"Seven-thirty sharp." + +"All right," said Ginger gloomily. + +The two men went their ways, Bruce Carmyle eastwards because he had +clients to see in his chambers at the Temple; Ginger westwards because +Mr. Carmyle had gone east. There was little sympathy between these +cousins: yet, oddly enough, their thoughts as they walked centred on the +same object. Bruce Carmyle, threading his way briskly through the crowds +of Piccadilly Circus, was thinking of Sally: and so was Ginger as he +loafed aimlessly towards Hyde Park Corner, bumping in a sort of coma +from pedestrian to pedestrian. + +Since his return to London Ginger had been in bad shape. He mooned +through the days and slept poorly at night. If there is one thing +rottener than another in a pretty blighted world, one thing which gives +a fellow the pip and reduces him to the condition of an absolute onion, +it is hopeless love. Hopeless love had got Ginger all stirred up. His +had been hitherto a placid soul. Even the financial crash which had so +altered his life had not bruised him very deeply. His temperament had +enabled him to bear the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune with +a philosophic "Right ho!" But now everything seemed different. Things +irritated him acutely, which before he had accepted as inevitable--his +Uncle Donald's moustache, for instance, and its owner's habit of +employing it during meals as a sort of zareba or earthwork against the +assaults of soup. + +"By gad!" thought Ginger, stopping suddenly opposite Devonshire House. +"If he uses that damned shrubbery as soup-strainer to-night, I'll slosh +him with a fork!" + +Hard thoughts... hard thoughts! And getting harder all the time, for +nothing grows more quickly than a mood of rebellion. Rebellion is a +forest fire that flames across the soul. The spark had been lighted in +Ginger, and long before he reached Hyde Park Corner he was ablaze and +crackling. By the time he returned to his club he was practically a +menace to society--to that section of it, at any rate, which embraced +his Uncle Donald, his minor uncles George and William, and his aunts +Mary, Geraldine, and Louise. + +Nor had the mood passed when he began to dress for the dismal +festivities of Bleke's Coffee House. He scowled as he struggled morosely +with an obstinate tie. One cannot disguise the fact--Ginger was warming +up. And it was just at this moment that Fate, as though it had been +waiting for the psychological instant, applied the finishing touch. +There was a knock at the door, and a waiter came in with a telegram. + +Ginger looked at the envelope. It had been readdressed and forwarded +on from the Hotel Normandie. It was a wireless, handed in on board the +White Star liner Olympic, and it ran as follows: + +Remember. Death to the Family. S. + +Ginger sat down heavily on the bed. + +The driver of the taxi-cab which at twenty-five minutes past seven drew +up at the dingy door of Bleke's Coffee House in the Strand was rather +struck by his fare's manner and appearance. A determined-looking sort of +young bloke, was the taxi-driver's verdict. + + + + +CHAPTER V. SALLY HEARS NEWS + + + +It had been Sally's intention, on arriving in New York, to take a room +at the St. Regis and revel in the gilded luxury to which her wealth +entitled her before moving into the small but comfortable apartment +which, as soon as she had the time, she intended to find and make her +permanent abode. But when the moment came and she was giving directions +to the taxi-driver at the dock, there seemed to her something +revoltingly Fillmorian about the scheme. It would be time enough to +sever herself from the boarding-house which had been her home for three +years when she had found the apartment. Meanwhile, the decent thing to +do, if she did not want to brand herself in the sight of her conscience +as a female Fillmore, was to go back temporarily to Mrs. Meecher's +admirable establishment and foregather with her old friends. After all, +home is where the heart is, even if there are more prunes there than the +gourmet would consider judicious. + +Perhaps it was the unavoidable complacency induced by the thought +that she was doing the right thing, or possibly it was the tingling +expectation of meeting Gerald Foster again after all these weeks of +separation, that made the familiar streets seem wonderfully bright as +she drove through them. It was a perfect, crisp New York morning, all +blue sky and amber sunshine, and even the ash-cans had a stimulating +look about them. The street cars were full of happy people rollicking +off to work: policemen directed the traffic with jaunty affability: +and the white-clad street-cleaners went about their poetic tasks with a +quiet but none the less noticeable relish. It was improbable that any of +these people knew that she was back, but somehow they all seemed to be +behaving as though this were a special day. + +The first discordant note in this overture of happiness was struck by +Mrs. Meecher, who informed Sally, after expressing her gratification +at the news that she required her old room, that Gerald Foster had left +town that morning. + +"Gone to Detroit, he has," said Mrs. Meecher. "Miss Doland, too." She +broke off to speak a caustic word to the boarding-house handyman, +who, with Sally's trunk as a weapon, was depreciating the value of the +wall-paper in the hall. "There's that play of his being tried out there, +you know, Monday," resumed Mrs. Meecher, after the handyman had bumped +his way up the staircase. "They been rehearsing ever since you left." + +Sally was disappointed, but it was such a beautiful morning, and New +York was so wonderful after the dull voyage in the liner that she was +not going to allow herself to be depressed without good reason. After +all, she could go on to Detroit tomorrow. It was nice to have something +to which she could look forward. + +"Oh, is Elsa in the company?" she said. + +"Sure. And very good too, I hear." Mrs. Meecher kept abreast of +theatrical gossip. She was an ex-member of the profession herself, +having been in the first production of "Florodora," though, unlike +everybody else, not one of the original Sextette. "Mr. Faucitt was down +to see a rehearsal, and he said Miss Doland was fine. And he's not easy +to please, as you know." + +"How is Mr. Faucitt?" + +Mrs. Meecher, not unwillingly, for she was a woman who enjoyed the +tragedies of life, made her second essay in the direction of lowering +Sally's uplifted mood. + +"Poor old gentleman, he ain't over and above well. Went to bed early +last night with a headache, and this morning I been to see him and he +don't look well. There's a lot of this Spanish influenza about. It might +be that. Lots o' people have been dying of it, if you believe what you +see in the papers," said Mrs. Meecher buoyantly. + +"Good gracious! You don't think...?" + +"Well, he ain't turned black," admitted Mrs. Meecher with regret. "They +say they turn black. If you believe what you see in the papers, that is. +Of course, that may come later," she added with the air of one confident +that all will come right in the future. "The doctor'll be in to see him +pretty soon. He's quite happy. Toto's sitting with him." + +Sally's concern increased. Like everyone who had ever spent any length +of time in the house, she had strong views on Toto. This quadruped, who +stained the fame of the entire canine race by posing as a dog, was a +small woolly animal with a persistent and penetrating yap, hard to bear +with equanimity in health and certainly quite outside the range of a +sick man. Her heart bled for Mr. Faucitt. Mrs. Meecher, on the other +hand, who held a faith in her little pet's amiability and power to +soothe which seven years' close association had been unable to shake, +seemed to feel that, with Toto on the spot, all that could be done had +been done as far as pampering the invalid was concerned. + +"I must go up and see him," cried Sally. "Poor old dear." + +"Sure. You know his room. You can hear Toto talking to him now," said +Mrs. Meecher complacently. "He wants a cracker, that's what he wants. +Toto likes a cracker after breakfast." + +The invalid's eyes, as Sally entered the room, turned wearily to the +door. At the sight of Sally they lit up with an incredulous rapture. +Almost any intervention would have pleased Mr. Faucitt at that moment, +for his little playmate had long outstayed any welcome that might +originally have been his: but that the caller should be his beloved +Sally seemed to the old man something in the nature of a return of the +age of miracles. + +"Sally!" + +"One moment. Here, Toto!" + +Toto, struck momentarily dumb by the sight of food, had jumped off the +bed and was standing with his head on one side, peering questioningly at +the cracker. He was a suspicious dog, but he allowed himself to be lured +into the passage, upon which Sally threw the cracker down and slipped +in and shut the door. Toto, after a couple of yaps, which may have been +gratitude or baffled fury, trotted off downstairs, and Mr. Faucitt drew +a deep breath. + +"Sally, you come, as ever, as an angel of mercy. Our worthy Mrs. Meecher +means well, and I yield to no man in my respect for her innate kindness +of heart: but she errs in supposing that that thrice-damned whelp of +hers is a combination of sick-nurse, soothing medicine, and a week at +the seaside. She insisted on bringing him here. He was yapping then, as +he was yapping when, with womanly resource which I cannot sufficiently +praise, you decoyed him hence. And each yap went through me like +hammer-strokes on sheeted tin. Sally, you stand alone among womankind. +You shine like a good deed in a naughty world. When did you get back?" + +"I've only just arrived in my hired barouche from the pier." + +"And you came to see your old friend without delay? I am grateful and +flattered. Sally, my dear." + +"Of course I came to see you. Do you suppose that, when Mrs. Meecher +told me you were sick, I just said 'Is that so?' and went on talking +about the weather? Well, what do you mean by it? Frightening everybody. +Poor old darling, do you feel very bad?" + +"One thousand individual mice are nibbling the base of my spine, and +I am conscious of a constant need of cooling refreshment. But what of +that? Your presence is a tonic. Tell me, how did our Sally enjoy foreign +travel?" + +"Our Sally had the time of her life." + +"Did you visit England?" + +"Only passing through." + +"How did it look?" asked Mr. Faucitt eagerly. + +"Moist. Very moist." + +"It would," said Mr. Faucitt indulgently. "I confess that, happy as I +have been in this country, there are times when I miss those wonderful +London days, when a sort of cosy brown mist hangs over the streets and +the pavements ooze with a perspiration of mud and water, and you see +through the haze the yellow glow of the Bodega lamps shining in the +distance like harbour-lights. Not," said Mr. Faucitt, "that I specify +the Bodega to the exclusion of other and equally worthy hostelries. I +have passed just as pleasant hours in Rule's and Short's. You missed +something by not lingering in England, Sally." + +"I know I did--pneumonia." + +Mr. Faucitt shook his head reproachfully. + +"You are prejudiced, my dear. You would have enjoyed London if you had +had the courage to brave its superficial gloom. Where did you spend your +holiday? Paris?" + +"Part of the time. And the rest of the while I was down by the sea. It +was glorious. I don't think I would ever have come back if I hadn't had +to. But, of course, I wanted to see you all again. And I wanted to be at +the opening of Mr. Foster's play. Mrs. Meecher tells me you went to one +of the rehearsals." + +"I attended a dog-fight which I was informed was a rehearsal," said Mr. +Faucitt severely. "There is no rehearsing nowadays." + +"Oh dear! Was it as bad as all that?" + +"The play is good. The play--I will go further--is excellent. It has +fat. But the acting..." + +"Mrs. Meecher said you told her that Elsa was good." + +"Our worthy hostess did not misreport me. Miss Doland has great +possibilities. She reminds me somewhat of Matilda Devine, under whose +banner I played a season at the Old Royalty in London many years ago. +She has the seeds of greatness in her, but she is wasted in the present +case on an insignificant part. There is only one part in the play. I +allude to the one murdered by Miss Mabel Hobson." + +"Murdered!" Sally's heart sank. She had been afraid of this, and it +was no satisfaction to feel that she had warned Gerald. "Is she very +terrible?" + +"She has the face of an angel and the histrionic ability of that curious +suet pudding which our estimable Mrs. Meecher is apt to give us on +Fridays. In my professional career I have seen many cases of what I may +term the Lady Friend in the role of star, but Miss Hobson eclipses them +all. I remember in the year '94 a certain scion of the plutocracy +took it into his head to present a female for whom he had conceived an +admiration in a part which would have taxed the resources of the ablest. +I was engaged in her support, and at the first rehearsal I recollect +saying to my dear old friend, Arthur Moseby--dead, alas, these many +years. An excellent juvenile, but, like so many good fellows, cursed +with a tendency to lift the elbow--I recollect saying to him 'Arthur, +dear boy, I give it two weeks.' 'Max,' was his reply, 'you are an +incurable optimist. One consecutive night, laddie, one consecutive +night.' We had, I recall, an even half-crown upon it. He won. We opened +at Wigan, our leading lady got the bird, and the show closed next day. +I was forcibly reminded of this incident as I watched Miss Hobson +rehearsing." + +"Oh, poor Ger--poor Mr. Foster!" + +"I do not share your commiseration for that young man," said Mr. Faucitt +austerely. "You probably are almost a stranger to him, but he and I have +been thrown together a good deal of late. A young man upon whom, mark my +words, success, if it ever comes, will have the worst effects. I dislike +him. Sally. He is, I think, without exception, the most selfish and +self-centred young man of my acquaintance. He reminds me very much +of old Billy Fothergill, with whom I toured a good deal in the later +eighties. Did I ever tell you the story of Billy and the amateur +who...?" + +Sally was in no mood to listen to the adventures of Mr. Fothergill. +The old man's innocent criticism of Gerald had stabbed her deeply. A +momentary impulse to speak hotly in his defence died away as she saw +Mr. Faucitt's pale, worn old face. He had meant no harm, after all. How +could he know what Gerald was to her? + +She changed the conversation abruptly. + +"Have you seen anything of Fillmore while I've been away?" + +"Fillmore? Why yes, my dear, curiously enough I happened to run into him +on Broadway only a few days ago. He seemed changed--less stiff and aloof +than he had been for some time past. I may be wronging him, but there +have been times of late when one might almost have fancied him a trifle +up-stage. All that was gone at our last encounter. He appeared glad to +see me and was most cordial." + +Sally found her composure restored. Her lecture on the night of the +party had evidently, she thought, not been wasted. Mr. Faucitt, however, +advanced another theory to account for the change in the Man of Destiny. + +"I rather fancy," he said, "that the softening influence has been the +young man's fiancee." + +"What? Fillmore's not engaged?" + +"Did he not write and tell you? I suppose he was waiting to inform you +when you returned. Yes, Fillmore is betrothed. The lady was with +him when we met. A Miss Winch. In the profession, I understand. He +introduced me. A very charming and sensible young lady, I thought." + +Sally shook her head. + +"She can't be. Fillmore would never have got engaged to anyone like +that. Was her hair crimson?" + +"Brown, if I recollect rightly." + +"Very loud, I suppose, and overdressed?" + +"On the contrary, neat and quiet." + +"You've made a mistake," said Sally decidedly. "She can't have been like +that. I shall have to look into this. It does seem hard that I can't go +away for a few weeks without all my friends taking to beds of sickness +and all my brothers getting ensnared by vampires." + +A knock at the door interrupted her complaint. Mrs. Meecher entered, +ushering in a pleasant little man with spectacles and black bag. + +"The doctor to see you, Mr. Faucitt." Mrs. Meecher cast an appraising +eye at the invalid, as if to detect symptoms of approaching +discoloration. "I've been telling him that what I think you've gotten is +this here new Spanish influenza. Two more deaths there were in the paper +this morning, if you can believe what you see..." + +"I wonder," said the doctor, "if you would mind going and bringing me a +small glass of water?" + +"Why, sure." + +"Not a large glass--a small glass. Just let the tap run for a few +moments and take care not to spill any as you come up the stairs. I +always ask ladies, like our friend who has just gone," he added as the +door closed, "to bring me a glass of water. It keeps them amused and +interested and gets them out of the way, and they think I am going to do +a conjuring trick with it. As a matter of fact, I'm going to drink it. +Now let's have a look at you." + +The examination did not take long. At the end of it the doctor seemed +somewhat chagrined. + +"Our good friend's diagnosis was correct. I'd give a leg to say it +wasn't, but it was. It is this here new Spanish influenza. Not a bad +attack. You want to stay in bed and keep warm, and I'll write you out a +prescription. You ought to be nursed. Is this young lady a nurse?" + +"No, no, merely..." + +"Of course I'm a nurse," said Sally decidedly. "It isn't difficult, +is it, doctor? I know nurses smooth pillows. I can do that. Is there +anything else?" + +"Their principal duty is to sit here and prevent the excellent and +garrulous lady who has just left us from getting in. They must also be +able to aim straight with a book or an old shoe, if that small woolly +dog I met downstairs tries to force an entrance. If you are equal to +these tasks, I can leave the case in your hands with every confidence." + +"But, Sally, my dear," said Mr. Faucitt, concerned, "you must not waste +your time looking after me. You have a thousand things to occupy you." + +"There's nothing I want to do more than help you to get better. I'll +just go out and send a wire, and then I'll be right back." + +Five minutes later, Sally was in a Western Union office, telegraphing +to Gerald that she would be unable to reach Detroit in time for the +opening. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. FIRST AID FOR FILLMORE + + + +1 + + + +It was not till the following Friday that Sally was able to start for +Detroit. She arrived on the Saturday morning and drove to the Hotel +Statler. Having ascertained that Gerald was stopping in the hotel and +having 'phoned up to his room to tell him to join her, she went into the +dining-room and ordered breakfast. + +She felt low-spirited as she waited for the food to arrive. The nursing +of Mr. Faucitt had left her tired, and she had not slept well on the +train. But the real cause of her depression was the fact that there had +been a lack of enthusiasm in Gerald's greeting over the telephone just +now. He had spoken listlessly, as though the fact of her returning +after all these weeks was a matter of no account, and she felt hurt and +perplexed. + +A cup of coffee had a stimulating effect. Men, of course, were always +like this in the early morning. It would, no doubt, be a very different +Gerald who would presently bound into the dining-room, quickened and +restored by a cold shower-bath. In the meantime, here was food, and she +needed it. + +She was pouring out her second cup of coffee when a stout young man, +of whom she had caught a glimpse as he moved about that section of the +hotel lobby which was visible through the open door of the dining-room, +came in and stood peering about as though in search of someone. The +momentary sight she had had of this young man had interested Sally. She +had thought how extraordinarily like he was to her brother Fillmore. Now +she perceived that it was Fillmore himself. + +Sally was puzzled. What could Fillmore be doing so far west? She had +supposed him to be a permanent resident of New York. But, of course, +your man of affairs and vast interests flits about all over the place. +At any rate, here he was, and she called him. And, after he had stood in +the doorway looking in every direction except the right one for another +minute, he saw her and came over to her table. + +"Why, Sally?" His manner, she thought, was nervous--one might almost +have said embarrassed. She attributed this to a guilty conscience. +Presently he would have to break to her the news that he had become +engaged to be married without her sisterly sanction, and no doubt he was +wondering how to begin. "What are you doing here? I thought you were in +Europe." + +"I got back a week ago, but I've been nursing poor old Mr. Faucitt ever +since then. He's been ill, poor old dear. I've come here to see Mr. +Foster's play, 'The Primrose Way,' you know. Is it a success?" + +"It hasn't opened yet." + +"Don't be silly, Fill. Do pull yourself together. It opened last +Monday." + +"No, it didn't. Haven't you heard? They've closed all the theatres +because of this infernal Spanish influenza. Nothing has been playing +this week. You must have seen it in the papers." + +"I haven't had time to read the papers. Oh, Fill, what an awful shame!" + +"Yes, it's pretty tough. Makes the company all on edge. I've had the +darndest time, I can tell you." + +"Why, what have you got to do with it?" + +Fillmore coughed. + +"I--er--oh, I didn't tell you that. I'm sort of--er--mixed up in the +show. Cracknell--you remember he was at college with me--suggested that +I should come down and look at it. Shouldn't wonder if he wants me to +put money into it and so on." + +"I thought he had all the money in the world." + +"Yes, he has a lot, but these fellows like to let a pal in on a good +thing." + +"Is it a good thing?" + +"The play's fine." + +"That's what Mr. Faucitt said. But Mabel Hobson..." + +Fillmore's ample face registered emotion. + +"She's an awful woman, Sally! She can't act, and she throws her +weight about all the time. The other day there was a fuss about a +paper-knife..." + +"How do you mean, a fuss about a paper-knife?" + +"One of the props, you know. It got mislaid. I'm certain it wasn't my +fault..." + +"How could it have been your fault?" asked Sally wonderingly. Love +seemed to have the worst effects on Fillmore's mentality. + +"Well--er--you know how it is. Angry woman... blames the first person +she sees... This paper-knife..." + +Fillmore's voice trailed off into pained silence. + +"Mr. Faucitt said Elsa Doland was good." + +"Oh, she's all right," said Fillmore indifferently. "But--" His face +brightened and animation crept into his voice. "But the girl you want to +watch is Miss Winch. Gladys Winch. She plays the maid. She's only in +the first act, and hasn't much to say, except 'Did you ring, madam?' and +things like that. But it's the way she says 'em! Sally, that girl's a +genius! The greatest character actress in a dozen years! You mark my +words, in a darned little while you'll see her name up on Broadway in +electric light. Personality? Ask me! Charm? She wrote the words and +music! Looks?..." + +"All right! All right! I know all about it, Fill. And will you kindly +inform me how you dared to get engaged without consulting me?" + +Fillmore blushed richly. + +"Oh, do you know?" + +"Yes. Mr. Faucitt told me." + +"Well..." + +"Well?" + +"Well, I'm only human," argued Fillmore. + +"I call that a very handsome admission. You've got quite modest, Fill." + +He had certainly changed for the better since their last meeting. + +It was as if someone had punctured him and let out all the pomposity. +If this was due, as Mr. Faucitt had suggested, to the influence of Miss +Winch, Sally felt that she could not but approve of the romance. + +"I'll introduce you sometime,' said Fillmore. + +"I want to meet her very much." + +"I'll have to be going now. I've got to see Bunbury. I thought he might +be in here." + +"Who's Bunbury?" + +"The producer. I suppose he is breakfasting in his room. I'd better go +up." + +"You are busy, aren't you. Little marvel! It's lucky they've got you to +look after them." + +Fillmore retired and Sally settled down to wait for Gerald, no longer +hurt by his manner over the telephone. Poor Gerald! No wonder he had +seemed upset. + +A few minutes later he came in. + +"Oh, Jerry darling," said Sally, as he reached the table, "I'm so sorry. +I've just been hearing about it." + +Gerald sat down. His appearance fulfilled the promise of his voice +over the telephone. A sort of nervous dullness wrapped him about like a +garment. + +"It's just my luck," he said gloomily. "It's the kind of thing that +couldn't happen to anyone but me. Damned fools! Where's the sense in +shutting the theatres, even if there is influenza about? They let people +jam against one another all day in the stores. If that doesn't hurt them +why should it hurt them to go to theatres? Besides, it's all infernal +nonsense about this thing. I don't believe there is such a thing as +Spanish influenza. People get colds in their heads and think they're +dying. It's all a fake scare." + +"I don't think it's that," said Sally. "Poor Mr. Faucitt had it quite +badly. That's why I couldn't come earlier." + +Gerald did not seem interested either by the news of Mr. Faucitt's +illness or by the fact that Sally, after delay, had at last arrived. He +dug a spoon sombrely into his grape-fruit. + +"We've been hanging about here day after day, getting bored to death +all the time... The company's going all to pieces. They're sick of +rehearsing and rehearsing when nobody knows if we'll ever open. They +were all keyed up a week ago, and they've been sagging ever since. It +will ruin the play, of course. My first chance! Just chucked away." + +Sally was listening with a growing feeling of desolation. She tried to +be fair, to remember that he had had a terrible disappointment and was +under a great strain. And yet... it was unfortunate that self-pity was a +thing she particularly disliked in a man. Her vanity, too, was hurt. It +was obvious that her arrival, so far from acting as a magic restorative, +had effected nothing. She could not help remembering, though it made +her feel disloyal, what Mr. Faucitt had said about Gerald. She had never +noticed before that he was remarkably self-centred, but he was thrusting +the fact upon her attention now. + +"That Hobson woman is beginning to make trouble," went on Gerald, +prodding in a despairing sort of way at scrambled eggs. "She ought never +to have had the part, never. She can't handle it. Elsa Doland could play +it a thousand times better. I wrote Elsa in a few lines the other day, +and the Hobson woman went right up in the air. You don't know what a +star is till you've seen one of these promoted clothes-props from the +Follies trying to be one. It took me an hour to talk her round and keep +her from throwing up her part." + +"Why not let her throw up her part?" + +"For heaven's sake talk sense," said Gerald querulously. "Do you suppose +that man Cracknell would keep the play on if she wasn't in it? He would +close the show in a second, and where would I be then? You don't seem +to realize that this is a big chance for me. I'd look a fool throwing it +away." + +"I see," said Sally, shortly. She had never felt so wretched in her +life. Foreign travel, she decided, was a mistake. It might be pleasant +and broadening to the mind, but it seemed to put you so out of touch +with people when you got back. She analysed her sensations, and arrived +at the conclusion that what she was resenting was the fact that Gerald +was trying to get the advantages of two attitudes simultaneously. A man +in trouble may either be the captain of his soul and superior to pity, +or he may be a broken thing for a woman to pet and comfort. Gerald, +it seemed to her, was advertising himself as an object for her +commiseration, and at the same time raising a barrier against it. He +appeared to demand her sympathy while holding himself aloof from it. She +had the uncomfortable sensation of feeling herself shut out and useless. + +"By the way," said Gerald, "there's one thing. I have to keep her +jollying along all the time, so for goodness' sake don't go letting it +out that we're engaged." + +Sally's chin went up with a jerk. This was too much. + +"If you find it a handicap being engaged to me..." + +"Don't be silly." Gerald took refuge in pathos. "Good God! It's tough! +Here am I, worried to death, and you..." + +Before he could finish the sentence, Sally's mood had undergone one +of those swift changes which sometimes made her feel that she must be +lacking in character. A simple, comforting thought had come to her, +altering her entire outlook. She had come off the train tired and +gritty, and what seemed the general out-of-jointness of the world was +entirely due, she decided, to the fact that she had not had a bath and +that her hair was all anyhow. She felt suddenly tranquil. If it was +merely her grubby and dishevelled condition that made Gerald seem to her +so different, all was well. She put her hand on his with a quick gesture +of penitence. + +"I'm so sorry," she said. "I've been a brute, but I do sympathize, +really." + +"I've had an awful time," mumbled Gerald. + +"I know, I know. But you never told me you were glad to see me." + +"Of course I'm glad to see you." + +"Why didn't you say so, then, you poor fish? And why didn't you ask me +if I had enjoyed myself in Europe?" + +"Did you enjoy yourself?" + +"Yes, except that I missed you so much. There! Now we can consider my +lecture on foreign travel finished, and you can go on telling me your +troubles." + +Gerald accepted the invitation. He spoke at considerable length, though +with little variety. It appeared definitely established in his mind that +Providence had invented Spanish influenza purely with a view to wrecking +his future. But now he seemed less aloof, more open to sympathy. +The brief thunderstorm had cleared the air. Sally lost that sense of +detachment and exclusion which had weighed upon her. + +"Well," said Gerald, at length, looking at his watch, "I suppose I had +better be off." + +"Rehearsal?" + +"Yes, confound it. It's the only way of getting through the day. Are you +coming along?" + +"I'll come directly I've unpacked and tidied myself up." + +"See you at the theatre, then." + +Sally went out and rang for the lift to take her up to her room. + + + +2 + + + +The rehearsal had started when she reached the theatre. As she entered +the dark auditorium, voices came to her with that thin and reedy effect +which is produced by people talking in an empty building. She sat down +at the back of the house, and, as her eyes grew accustomed to the gloom, +was able to see Gerald sitting in the front row beside a man with a bald +head fringed with orange hair whom she took correctly to be Mr. Bunbury, +the producer. Dotted about the house in ones and twos were members of +the company whose presence was not required in the first act. On the +stage, Elsa Doland, looking very attractive, was playing a scene with a +man in a bowler hat. She was speaking a line, as Sally came in. + +"Why, what do you mean, father?" + +"Tiddly-omty-om," was the bowler-hatted one's surprising reply. +"Tiddly-omty-om... long speech ending in 'find me in the library.' And +exit," said the man in the bowler hat, starting to do so. + +For the first time Sally became aware of the atmosphere of nerves. +Mr. Bunbury, who seemed to be a man of temperament, picked up his +walking-stick, which was leaning against the next seat, and flung it +with some violence across the house. + +"For God's sake!" said Mr. Bunbury. + +"Now what?" inquired the bowler hat, interested, pausing hallway across +the stage. + +"Do speak the lines, Teddy," exclaimed Gerald. "Don't skip them in that +sloppy fashion." + +"You don't want me to go over the whole thing?" asked the bowler hat, +amazed. + +"Yes!" + +"Not the whole damn thing?" queried the bowler hat, fighting with +incredulity. + +"This is a rehearsal," snapped Mr. Bunbury. "If we are not going to do +it properly, what's the use of doing it at all?" + +This seemed to strike the erring Teddy, if not as reasonable, at any +rate as one way of looking at it. He delivered the speech in an injured +tone and shuffled off. The atmosphere of tenseness was unmistakable now. +Sally could feel it. The world of the theatre is simply a large nursery +and its inhabitants children who readily become fretful if anything goes +wrong. The waiting and the uncertainty, the loafing about in strange +hotels in a strange city, the dreary rehearsing of lines which had been +polished to the last syllable more than a week ago--these things had +sapped the nerve of the Primrose Way company and demoralization had set +in. It would require only a trifle to produce an explosion. + +Elsa Doland now moved to the door, pressed a bell, and, taking a +magazine from the table, sat down in a chair near the footlights. +A moment later, in answer to the ring, a young woman entered, to be +greeted instantly by an impassioned bellow from Mr. Bunbury. + +"Miss Winch!" + +The new arrival stopped and looked out over the footlights, not in the +pained manner of the man in the bowler hat, but with the sort of +genial indulgence of one who has come to a juvenile party to amuse the +children. She was a square, wholesome, good-humoured looking girl with +a serious face, the gravity of which was contradicted by the faint smile +that seemed to lurk about the corner of her mouth. She was certainly not +pretty, and Sally, watching her with keen interest, was surprised that +Fillmore had had the sense to disregard surface homeliness and recognize +her charm. Deep down in Fillmore, Sally decided, there must lurk an +unsuspected vein of intelligence. + +"Hello?" said Miss Winch, amiably. + +Mr. Bunbury seemed profoundly moved. + +"Miss Winch, did I or did I not ask you to refrain from chewing gum +during rehearsal?" + +"That's right, so you did," admitted Miss Winch, chummily. + +"Then why are you doing it?" + +Fillmore's fiancee revolved the criticized refreshment about her tongue +for a moment before replying. + +"Bit o' business," she announced, at length. + +"What do you mean, a bit of business?" + +"Character stuff," explained Miss Winch in her pleasant, drawling voice. +"Thought it out myself. Maids chew gum, you know." + +Mr. Bunbury ruffled his orange hair in an over-wrought manner with the +palm of his right hand. + +"Have you ever seen a maid?" he asked, despairingly. + +"Yes, sir. And they chew gum." + +"I mean a parlour-maid in a smart house," moaned Mr. Bunbury. "Do you +imagine for a moment that in a house such as this is supposed to be the +parlour-maid would be allowed to come into the drawing-room champing +that disgusting, beastly stuff?" + +Miss Winch considered the point. + +"Maybe you're right." She brightened. "Listen! Great idea! Mr. Foster +can write in a line for Elsa, calling me down, and another giving me +a good come-back, and then another for Elsa saying something else, and +then something really funny for me, and so on. We can work it up into a +big comic scene. Five or six minutes, all laughs." + +This ingenious suggestion had the effect of depriving the producer +momentarily of speech, and while he was struggling for utterance, there +dashed out from the wings a gorgeous being in blue velvet and a hat of +such unimpeachable smartness that Sally ached at the sight of it with a +spasm of pure envy. + +"Say!" + +Miss Mabel Hobson had practically every personal advantage which +nature can bestow with the exception of a musical voice. Her figure was +perfect, her face beautiful, and her hair a mass of spun gold; but her +voice in moments of emotion was the voice of a peacock. + +"Say, listen to me for just one moment!" + +Mr. Bunbury recovered from his trance. + +"Miss Hobson! Please!" + +"Yes, that's all very well..." + +"You are interrupting the rehearsal." + +"You bet your sorrowful existence I'm interrupting the rehearsal," +agreed Miss Hobson, with emphasis. "And, if you want to make a little +easy money, you go and bet somebody ten seeds that I'm going to +interrupt it again every time there's any talk of writing up any darned +part in the show except mine. Write up other people's parts? Not while I +have my strength!" + +A young man with butter-coloured hair, who had entered from the wings in +close attendance on the injured lady, attempted to calm the storm. + +"Now, sweetie!" + +"Oh, can it, Reggie!" said Miss Hobson, curtly. + +Mr. Cracknell obediently canned it. He was not one of your brutal +cave-men. He subsided into the recesses of a high collar and began to +chew the knob of his stick. + +"I'm the star," resumed Miss Hobson, vehemently, "and, if you think +anybody else's part's going to be written up... well, pardon me while I +choke with laughter! If so much as a syllable is written into anybody's +part, I walk straight out on my two feet. You won't see me go, I'll be +so quick." + +Mr. Bunbury sprang to his feet and waved his hands. + +"For heaven's sake! Are we rehearsing, or is this a debating society? +Miss Hobson, nothing is going to be written into anybody's part. Now are +you satisfied?" + +"She said..." + +"Oh, never mind," observed Miss Winch, equably. "It was only a random +thought. Working for the good of the show all the time. That's me." + +"Now, sweetie!" pleaded Mr. Cracknell, emerging from the collar like a +tortoise. + +Miss Hobson reluctantly allowed herself to be reassured. + +"Oh, well, that's all right, then. But don't forget I know how to look +after myself," she said, stating a fact which was abundantly obvious to +all who had had the privilege of listening to her. "Any raw work, and +out I walk so quick it'll make you giddy." + +She retired, followed by Mr. Cracknell, and the wings swallowed her up. + +"Shall I say my big speech now?" inquired Miss Winch, over the +footlights. + +"Yes, yes! Get on with the rehearsal. We've wasted half the morning." + +"Did you ring, madam?" said Miss Winch to Elsa, who had been reading her +magazine placidly through the late scene. + +The rehearsal proceeded, and Sally watched it with a sinking heart. It +was all wrong. Novice as she was in things theatrical, she could see +that. There was no doubt that Miss Hobson was superbly beautiful and +would have shed lustre on any part which involved the minimum of words +and the maximum of clothes: but in the pivotal role of a serious play, +her very physical attributes only served to emphasize and point her +hopeless incapacity. Sally remembered Mr. Faucitt's story of the lady +who got the bird at Wigan. She did not see how history could fail to +repeat itself. The theatrical public of America will endure much from +youth and beauty, but there is a limit. + +A shrill, passionate cry from the front row, and Mr. Bunbury was on his +feet again. Sally could not help wondering whether things were going +particularly wrong to-day, or whether this was one of Mr. Bunbury's +ordinary mornings. + +"Miss Hobson!" + +The action of the drama had just brought that emotional lady on left +centre and had taken her across to the desk which stood on the other +side of the stage. The desk was an important feature of the play, for it +symbolized the absorption in business which, exhibited by her husband, +was rapidly breaking Miss Hobson's heart. He loved his desk better than +his young wife, that was what it amounted to, and no wife can stand that +sort of thing. + +"Oh, gee!" said Miss Hobson, ceasing to be the distressed wife and +becoming the offended star. "What's it this time?" + +"I suggested at the last rehearsal and at the rehearsal before and +the rehearsal before that, that, on that line, you, should pick up +the paper-knife and toy negligently with it. You did it yesterday, and +to-day you've forgotten it again." + +"My God!" cried Miss Hobson, wounded to the quick. "If this don't beat +everything! How the heck can I toy negligently with a paper-knife when +there's no paper-knife for me to toy negligently with?" + +"The paper-knife is on the desk." + +"It's not on the desk." + +"No paper-knife?" + +"No paper-knife. And it's no good picking on me. I'm the star, not the +assistant stage manager. If you're going to pick on anybody, pick on +him." + +The advice appeared to strike Mr. Bunbury as good. He threw back his +head and bayed like a bloodhound. + +There was a momentary pause, and then from the wings on the prompt side +there shambled out a stout and shrinking figure, in whose hand was a +script of the play and on whose face, lit up by the footlights, there +shone a look of apprehension. It was Fillmore, the Man of Destiny. + + + +3 + + + +Alas, poor Fillmore! He stood in the middle of the stage with the +lightning of Mr. Bunbury's wrath playing about his defenceless head, and +Sally, recovering from her first astonishment, sent a wave of sisterly +commiseration floating across the theatre to him. She did not often pity +Fillmore. His was a nature which in the sunshine of prosperity had a +tendency to grow a trifle lush; and such of the minor ills of life as +had afflicted him during the past three years, had, she considered, +been wholesome and educative and a matter not for concern but for +congratulation. Unmoved, she had watched him through that lean period +lunching on coffee and buckwheat cakes, and curbing from motives of +economy a somewhat florid taste in dress. But this was different. This +was tragedy. Somehow or other, blasting disaster must have smitten the +Fillmore bank-roll, and he was back where he had started. His presence +here this morning could mean nothing else. + +She recalled his words at the breakfast-table about financing the +play. How like Fillmore to try to save his face for the moment with an +outrageous bluff, though well aware that he would have to reveal the +truth sooner or later. She realized how he must have felt when he had +seen her at the hotel. Yes, she was sorry for Fillmore. + +And, as she listened to the fervent eloquence of Mr. Bunbury, she +perceived that she had every reason to be. Fillmore was having a bad +time. One of the chief articles of faith in the creed of all theatrical +producers is that if anything goes wrong it must be the fault of the +assistant stage manager and Mr. Bunbury was evidently orthodox in his +views. He was showing oratorical gifts of no mean order. The paper-knife +seemed to inspire him. Gradually, Sally began to get the feeling that +this harmless, necessary stage-property was the source from which +sprang most, if not all, of the trouble in the world. It had disappeared +before. Now it had disappeared again. Could Mr. Bunbury go on struggling +in a universe where this sort of thing happened? He seemed to doubt it. +Being a red-blooded, one-hundred-per-cent American man, he would try +hard, but it was a hundred to one shot that he would get through. He +had asked for a paper-knife. There was no paper-knife. Why was there no +paper-knife? Where was the paper-knife anyway? + +"I assure you, Mr. Bunbury," bleated the unhappy Fillmore, obsequiously. +"I placed it with the rest of the properties after the last rehearsal." + +"You couldn't have done." + +"I assure you I did." + +"And it walked away, I suppose," said Miss Hobson with cold scorn, +pausing in the operation of brightening up her lower lip with a +lip-stick. + +A calm, clear voice spoke. + +"It was taken away," said the calm, clear voice. + +Miss Winch had added herself to the symposium. She stood beside +Fillmore, chewing placidly. It took more than raised voices and +gesticulating hands to disturb Miss Winch. + +"Miss Hobson took it," she went on in her cosy, drawling voice. "I saw +her." + +Sensation in court. The prisoner, who seemed to feel his position +deeply, cast a pop-eyed glance full of gratitude at his advocate. +Mr. Bunbury, in his capacity of prosecuting attorney, ran his fingers +through his hair in some embarrassment, for he was regretting now that +he had made such a fuss. Miss Hobson thus assailed by an underling, +spun round and dropped the lip-stick, which was neatly retrieved by the +assiduous Mr. Cracknell. Mr. Cracknell had his limitations, but he was +rather good at picking up lip-sticks. + +"What's that? I took it? I never did anything of the sort." + +"Miss Hobson took it after the rehearsal yesterday," drawled Gladys +Winch, addressing the world in general, "and threw it negligently at the +theatre cat." + +Miss Hobson seemed taken aback. Her composure was not restored by Mr. +Bunbury's next remark. The producer, like his company, had been feeling +the strain of the past few days, and, though as a rule he avoided +anything in the nature of a clash with the temperamental star, this +matter of the missing paper-knife had bitten so deeply into his soul +that he felt compelled to speak his mind. + +"In future, Miss Hobson, I should be glad if, when you wish to throw +anything at the cat, you would not select a missile from the property +box. Good heavens!" he cried, stung by the way fate was maltreating +him, "I have never experienced anything like this before. I have +been producing plays all my life, and this is the first time this has +happened. I have produced Nazimova. Nazimova never threw paper-knives at +cats." + +"Well, I hate cats," said Miss Hobson, as though that settled it. + +"I," murmured Miss Winch, "love little pussy, her fur is so warm, and if +I don't hurt her she'll do me no..." + +"Oh, my heavens!" shouted Gerald Foster, bounding from his seat and for +the first time taking a share in the debate. "Are we going to spend the +whole day arguing about cats and paper-knives? For goodness' sake, clear +the stage and stop wasting time." + +Miss Hobson chose to regard this intervention as an affront. + +"Don't shout at me, Mr. Foster!" + +"I wasn't shouting at you." + +"If you have anything to say to me, lower your voice." + +"He can't," observed Miss Winch. "He's a tenor." + +"Nazimova never..." began Mr. Bunbury. + +Miss Hobson was not to be diverted from her theme by reminiscences of +Nazimova. She had not finished dealing with Gerald. + +"In the shows I've been in," she said, mordantly, "the author wasn't +allowed to go about the place getting fresh with the leading lady. In +the shows I've been in the author sat at the back and spoke when he was +spoken to. In the shows I've been in..." + +Sally was tingling all over. This reminded her of the dog-fight on the +Roville sands. She wanted to be in it, and only the recognition that it +was a private fight and that she would be intruding kept her silent. The +lure of the fray, however, was too strong for her wholly to resist it. +Almost unconsciously, she had risen from her place and drifted down the +aisle so as to be nearer the white-hot centre of things. She was now +standing in the lighted space by the orchestra-pit, and her presence +attracted the roving attention of Miss Hobson, who, having concluded her +remarks on authors and their legitimate sphere of activity, was looking +about for some other object of attack. + +"Who the devil," inquired Miss Hobson, "is that?" + +Sally found herself an object of universal scrutiny and wished that she +had remained in the obscurity of the back rows. + +"I am Mr. Nicholas' sister," was the best method of identification that +she could find. + +"Who's Mr. Nicholas?" + +Fillmore timidly admitted that he was Mr. Nicholas. He did it in the +manner of one in the dock pleading guilty to a major charge, and +at least half of those present seemed surprised. To them, till now, +Fillmore had been a nameless thing, answering to the shout of "Hi!" + +Miss Hobson received the information with a laugh of such exceeding +bitterness that strong men blanched and Mr. Cracknell started so +convulsively that he nearly jerked his collar off its stud. + +"Now, sweetie!" urged Mr. Cracknell. + +Miss Hobson said that Mr. Cracknell gave her a pain in the gizzard. She +recommended his fading away, and he did so--into his collar. He seemed +to feel that once well inside his collar he was "home" and safe from +attack. + +"I'm through!" announced Miss Hobson. It appeared that Sally's presence +had in some mysterious fashion fulfilled the function of the last straw. +"This is the by-Goddest show I was ever in! I can stand for a whole lot, +but when it comes to the assistant stage manager being allowed to fill +the theatre with his sisters and his cousins and his aunts it's time to +quit." + +"But, sweetie!" pleaded Mr. Cracknell, coming to the surface. + +"Oh, go and choke yourself!" said Miss Hobson, crisply. And, swinging +round like a blue panther, she strode off. A door banged, and the sound +of it seemed to restore Mr. Cracknell's power of movement. He, too, shot +up stage and disappeared. + +"Hello, Sally," said Elsa Doland, looking up from her magazine. The +battle, raging all round her, had failed to disturb her detachment. +"When did you get back?" + +Sally trotted up the steps which had been propped against the stage to +form a bridge over the orchestra pit. + +"Hello, Elsa." + +The late debaters had split into groups. Mr. Bunbury and Gerald were +pacing up and down the central aisle, talking earnestly. Fillmore had +subsided into a chair. + +"Do you know Gladys Winch?" asked Elsa. + +Sally shook hands with the placid lodestar of her brother's affections. +Miss Winch, on closer inspection, proved to have deep grey eyes and +freckles. Sally's liking for her increased. + +"Thank you for saving Fillmore from the wolves," she said. "They would +have torn him in pieces but for you." + +"Oh, I don't know," said Miss Winch. + +"It was noble." + +"Oh, well!" + +"I think," said Sally, "I'll go and have a talk with Fillmore. He looks +as though he wanted consoling." + +She made her way to that picturesque ruin. + + + +4 + + + +Fillmore had the air of a man who thought it wasn't loaded. A wild, +startled expression had settled itself upon his face and he was +breathing heavily. + +"Cheer up!" said Sally. Fillmore jumped like a stricken jelly. "Tell me +all," said Sally, sitting down beside him. "I leave you a gentleman of +large and independent means, and I come back and find you one of the +wage-slaves again. How did it all happen?" + +"Sally," said Fillmore, "I will be frank with you. Can you lend me ten +dollars?" + +"I don't see how you make that out an answer to my question, but here +you are." + +"Thanks." Fillmore pocketed the bill. "I'll let you have it back next +week. I want to take Miss Winch out to lunch." + +"If that's what you want it for, don't look on it as a loan, take it as +a gift with my blessing thrown in." She looked over her shoulder at +Miss Winch, who, the cares of rehearsal being temporarily suspended, was +practising golf-shots with an umbrella at the other side of the stage. +"However did you have the sense to fall in love with her, Fill?" + +"Do you like her?" asked Fillmore, brightening. + +"I love her." + +"I knew you would. She's just the right girl for me, isn't she?" + +"She certainly is." + +"So sympathetic." + +"Yes." + +"So kind." + +"Yes." + +"And she's got brains enough for two, which is the exact quantity the +girl who marries you will need." + +Fillmore drew himself up with as much hauteur as a stout man sitting in +a low chair can achieve. + +"Some day I will make you believe in me, Sally." + +"Less of the Merchant Prince, my lad," said Sally, firmly. "You just +confine yourself to explaining how you got this way, instead of taking +up my valuable time telling me what you mean to do in the future. You've +lost all your money?" + +"I have suffered certain reverses," said Fillmore, with dignity, "which +have left me temporarily... Yes, every bean," he concluded simply. + +"How?" + +"Well..." Fillmore hesitated. "I've had bad luck, you know. First I +bought Consolidated Rails for the rise, and they fell. So that went +wrong." + +"Yes?" + +"And then I bought Russian Roubles for the fall, and they rose. So that +went wrong." + +"Good gracious! Why, I've heard all this before." + +"Who told you?" + +"No, I remember now. It's just that you remind me of a man I met at +Roville. He was telling me the story of his life, and how he had made a +hash of everything. Well, that took all you had, I suppose?" + +"Not quite. I had a few thousand left, and I went into a deal that +really did look cast-iron." + +"And that went wrong!" + +"It wasn't my fault," said Fillmore querulously. "It was just my +poisonous luck. A man I knew got me to join a syndicate which had +bought up a lot of whisky. The idea was to ship it into Chicago in +herring-barrels. We should have cleaned up big, only a mutt of a +detective took it into his darned head to go fooling about with a +crowbar. Officious ass! It wasn't as if the barrels weren't labelled +'Herrings' as plainly as they could be," said Fillmore with honest +indignation. He shuddered. "I nearly got arrested." + +"But that went wrong? Well, that's something to be thankful for. Stripes +wouldn't suit your figure." Sally gave his arm a squeeze. She was +very fond of Fillmore, though for the good of his soul she generally +concealed her affection beneath a manner which he had once compared, +not without some reason, to that of a governess who had afflicted their +mutual childhood. "Never mind, you poor ill-used martyr. Things are sure +to come right. We shall see you a millionaire some day. And, oh heavens, +brother Fillmore, what a bore you'll be when you are! I can just see +you being interviewed and giving hints to young men on how to make good. +'Mr. Nicholas attributes his success to sheer hard work. He can lay his +hand on his bulging waistcoat and say that he has never once indulged in +those rash get-rich-quick speculations, where you buy for the rise and +watch things fall and then rush out and buy for the fall and watch 'em +rise.' Fill... I'll tell you what I'll do. They all say it's the first +bit of money that counts in building a vast fortune. I'll lend you some +of mine." + +"You will? Sally, I always said you were an ace." + +"I never heard you. You oughtn't to mumble so." + +"Will you lend me twenty thousand dollars?" + +Sally patted his hand soothingly. + +"Come slowly down to earth," she said. "Two hundred was the sum I had in +mind." + +"I want twenty thousand." + +"You'd better rob a bank. Any policeman will direct you to a good bank." + +"I'll tell you why I want twenty thousand." + +"You might just mention it." + +"If I had twenty thousand, I'd buy this production from Cracknell. He'll +be back in a few minutes to tell us that the Hobson woman has quit: and, +if she really has, you take it from me that he will close the show. And, +even if he manages to jolly her along this time and she comes back, it's +going to happen sooner or later. It's a shame to let a show like this +close. I believe in it, Sally. It's a darn good play. With Elsa Doland +in the big part, it couldn't fail." + +Sally started. Her money was too recent for her to have grown fully +accustomed to it, and she had never realized that she was in a position +to wave a wand and make things happen on any big scale. The financing of +a theatrical production had always been to her something mysterious +and out of the reach of ordinary persons like herself. Fillmore, that +spacious thinker, had brought it into the sphere of the possible. + +"He'd sell for less than that, of course, but one would need a bit in +hand. You have to face a loss on the road before coming into New York. +I'd give you ten per cent on your money, Sally." + +Sally found herself wavering. The prudent side of her nature, which +hitherto had steered her safely through most of life's rapids, seemed +oddly dormant. Sub-consciously she was aware that on past performances +Fillmore was decidedly not the man to be allowed control of anybody's +little fortune, but somehow the thought did not seem to grip her. He had +touched her imagination. + +"It's a gold-mine!" + +Sally's prudent side stirred in its sleep. Fillmore had chosen an +unfortunate expression. To the novice in finance the word gold-mine +had repellent associations. If there was one thing in which Sally had +proposed not to invest her legacy, it was a gold-mine; what she had had +in view, as a matter of fact, had been one of those little fancy shops +which are called Ye Blue Bird or Ye Corner Shoppe, or something like +that, where you sell exotic bric-a-brac to the wealthy at extortionate +prices. She knew two girls who were doing splendidly in that line. As +Fillmore spoke those words, Ye Corner Shoppe suddenly looked very good +to her. + +At this moment, however, two things happened. Gerald and Mr. Bunbury, +in the course of their perambulations, came into the glow of the +footlights, and she was able to see Gerald's face: and at the same time +Mr. Reginald Cracknell hurried on to the stage, his whole demeanour that +of the bearer of evil tidings. + +The sight of Gerald's face annihilated Sally's prudence at a single +stroke. Ye Corner Shoppe, which a moment before had been shining +brightly before her mental eye, flickered and melted out. The whole +issue became clear and simple. Gerald was miserable and she had it in +her power to make him happy. He was sullenly awaiting disaster and she +with a word could avert it. She wondered that she had ever hesitated. + +"All right," she said simply. + +Fillmore quivered from head to foot. A powerful electric shock could not +have produced a stronger convulsion. He knew Sally of old as cautious +and clear-headed, by no means to be stampeded by a brother's eloquence; +and he had never looked on this thing as anything better than a hundred +to one shot. + +"You'll do it?" he whispered, and held his breath. After all he might +not have heard correctly. + +"Yes." + +All the complex emotion in Fillmore's soul found expression in one vast +whoop. It rang through the empty theatre like the last trump, beating +against the back wall and rising in hollow echoes to the very gallery. +Mr. Bunbury, conversing in low undertones with Mr. Cracknell across the +footlights, shied like a startled mule. There was reproach and menace in +the look he cast at Fillmore, and a minute earlier it would have reduced +that financial magnate to apologetic pulp. But Fillmore was not to +be intimidated now by a look. He strode down to the group at the +footlights, + +"Cracknell," he said importantly, "one moment, I should like a word with +you." + + + + +CHAPTER VII. SOME MEDITATIONS ON SUCCESS + + + +If actors and actresses are like children in that they are readily +depressed by disaster, they have the child's compensating gift of being +easily uplifted by good fortune. It amazed Sally that any one mortal +should have been able to spread such universal happiness as she had +done by the simple act of lending her brother Fillmore twenty thousand +dollars. If the Millennium had arrived, the members of the Primrose +Way Company could not have been on better terms with themselves. The +lethargy and dispiritedness, caused by their week of inaction, fell from +them like a cloak. The sudden elevation of that creature of the abyss, +the assistant stage manager, to the dizzy height of proprietor of the +show appealed to their sense of drama. Most of them had played in pieces +where much the same thing had happened to the persecuted heroine round +about eleven o'clock, and the situation struck them as theatrically +sound. Also, now that she had gone, the extent to which Miss Hobson had +acted as a blight was universally recognized. + +A spirit of optimism reigned, and cheerful rumours became current. The +bowler-hatted Teddy had it straight from the lift-boy at his hotel that +the ban on the theatres was to be lifted on Tuesday at the latest; while +no less an authority than the cigar-stand girl at the Pontchatrain had +informed the man who played the butler that Toledo and Cleveland were +opening to-morrow. It was generally felt that the sun was bursting +through the clouds and that Fate would soon despair of the hopeless task +of trying to keep good men down. + +Fillmore was himself again. We all have our particular mode of +self-expression in moments of elation. Fillmore's took the shape of +buying a new waistcoat and a hundred half-dollar cigars and being very +fussy about what he had for lunch. It may have been an optical illusion, +but he appeared to Sally to put on at least six pounds in weight on the +first day of the new regime. As a serf looking after paper-knives and +other properties, he had been--for him--almost slim. As a manager +he blossomed out into soft billowy curves, and when he stood on the +sidewalk in front of the theatre, gloating over the new posters which +bore the legend, + + FILLMORE NICHOLAS + + PRESENTS + + +the populace had to make a detour to get round him. + +In this era of bubbling joy, it was hard that Sally, the fairy godmother +responsible for it all, should not have been completely happy too; and +it puzzled her why she was not. But whatever it was that cast the faint +shadow refused obstinately to come out from the back of her mind and +show itself and be challenged. It was not till she was out driving in +a hired car with Gerald one afternoon on Belle Isle that enlightenment +came. + +Gerald, since the departure of Miss Hobson, had been at his best. Like +Fillmore, he was a man who responded to the sunshine of prosperity. His +moodiness had vanished, and all his old charm had returned. And yet... +it seemed to Sally, as the car slid smoothly through the pleasant woods +and fields by the river, that there was something that jarred. + +Gerald was cheerful and talkative. He, at any rate, found nothing wrong +with life. He held forth spaciously on the big things he intended to do. + +"If this play get over--and it's going to--I'll show 'em!" His jaw was +squared, and his eyes glowed as they stared into the inviting future. +"One success--that's all I need--then watch me! I haven't had a chance +yet, but..." + +His voice rolled on, but Sally had ceased to listen. It was the time of +year when the chill of evening follows swiftly on the mellow warmth +of afternoon. The sun had gone behind the trees, and a cold wind was +blowing up from the river. And quite suddenly, as though it was the +wind that had cleared her mind, she understood what it was that had been +lurking at the back of her thoughts. For an instant it stood out nakedly +without concealment, and the world became a forlorn place. She had +realized the fundamental difference between man's outlook on life and +woman's. + +Success! How men worshipped it, and how little of themselves they had to +spare for anything else. Ironically, it was the theme of this very play +of Gerald's which she had saved from destruction. Of all the men she +knew, how many had any view of life except as a race which they must +strain every nerve to win, regardless of what they missed by the wayside +in their haste? Fillmore--Gerald--all of them. There might be a woman in +each of their lives, but she came second--an afterthought--a thing for +their spare time. Gerald was everything to her. His success would never +be more than a side-issue as far as she was concerned. He himself, +without any of the trappings of success, was enough for her. But she was +not enough for him. A spasm of futile jealousy shook her. She shivered. + +"Cold?" said Gerald. "I'll tell the man to drive back... I don't see any +reason why this play shouldn't run a year in New York. Everybody says +it's good... if it does get over, they'll all be after me. I..." + +Sally stared out into a bleak world. The sky was a leaden grey, and the +wind from the river blew with a dismal chill. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. REAPPEARANCE OF MR. CARMYLE--AND GINGER + + + +1 + + + +When Sally left Detroit on the following Saturday, accompanied by +Fillmore, who was returning to the metropolis for a few days in order to +secure offices and generally make his presence felt along Broadway, her +spirits had completely recovered. She felt guiltily that she had been +fanciful, even morbid. Naturally men wanted to get on in the world. +It was their job. She told herself that she was bound up with Gerald's +success, and that the last thing of which she ought to complain was the +energy he put into efforts of which she as well as he would reap the +reward. + +To this happier frame of mind the excitement of the last few days had +contributed. Detroit, that city of amiable audiences, had liked "The +Primrose Way." The theatre, in fulfilment of Teddy's prophecy, had +been allowed to open on the Tuesday, and a full house, hungry for +entertainment after its enforced abstinence, had welcomed the play +wholeheartedly. The papers, not always in agreement with the applause of +a first-night audience, had on this occasion endorsed the verdict, with +agreeable unanimity hailing Gerald as the coming author and Elsa Doland +as the coming star. There had even been a brief mention of Fillmore as +the coming manager. But there is always some trifle that jars in our +greatest moments, and Fillmore's triumph had been almost spoilt by the +fact that the only notice taken of Gladys Winch was by the critic who +printed her name--spelt Wunch--in the list of those whom the cast "also +included." + +"One of the greatest character actresses on the stage," said Fillmore +bitterly, talking over this outrage with Sally on the morning after the +production. + +From this blow, however, his buoyant nature had soon enabled him to +rally. Life contained so much that was bright that it would have been +churlish to concentrate the attention on the one dark spot. Business had +been excellent all through the week. Elsa Doland had got better at +every performance. The receipt of a long and agitated telegram from Mr. +Cracknell, pleading to be allowed to buy the piece back, the passage of +time having apparently softened Miss Hobson, was a pleasant incident. +And, best of all, the great Ike Schumann, who owned half the theatres +in New York and had been in Detroit superintending one of his musical +productions, had looked in one evening and stamped "The Primrose Way" +with the seal of his approval. As Fillmore sat opposite Sally on the +train, he radiated contentment and importance. + +"Yes, do," said Sally, breaking a long silence. + +Fillmore awoke from happy dreams. + +"Eh?" + +"I said 'Yes, do.' I think you owe it to your position." + +"Do what?" + +"Buy a fur coat. Wasn't that what you were meditating about?" + +"Don't be a chump," said Fillmore, blushing nevertheless. It was true +that once or twice during the past week he had toyed negligently, as +Mr. Bunbury would have said, with the notion, and why not? A fellow must +keep warm. + +"With an astrakhan collar," insisted Sally. + +"As a matter of fact," said Fillmore loftily, his great soul ill-attuned +to this badinage, "what I was really thinking about at the moment was +something Ike said." + +"Ike?" + +"Ike Schumann. He's on the train. I met him just now." + +"We call him Ike!" + +"Of course I call him Ike," said Fillmore heatedly. "Everyone calls him +Ike." + +"He wears a fur coat," Sally murmured. + +Fillmore registered annoyance. + +"I wish you wouldn't keep on harping on that damned coat. And, anyway, +why shouldn't I have a fur coat?" + +"Fill...! How can you be so brutal as to suggest that I ever said you +shouldn't? Why, I'm one of the strongest supporters of the fur coat. +With big cuffs. And you must roll up Fifth Avenue in your car, and I'll +point and say 'That's my brother!' 'Your brother? No!' 'He is, really.' +'You're joking. Why, that's the great Fillmore Nicholas.' 'I know. But +he really is my brother. And I was with him when he bought that coat.'" + +"Do leave off about the coat!" + +"'And it isn't only the coat,' I shall say. 'It's what's underneath. +Tucked away inside that mass of fur, dodging about behind that dollar +cigar, is one to whom we point with pride... '" + +Fillmore looked coldly at his watch. + +"I've got to go and see Ike Schumann." + +"We are in hourly consultation with Ike." + +"He wants to see me about the show. He suggests putting it into Chicago +before opening in New York." + +"Oh no," cried Sally, dismayed. + +"Why not?" + +Sally recovered herself. Identifying Gerald so closely with his play, +she had supposed for a moment that if the piece opened in Chicago it +would mean a further prolonged separation from him. But of course there +would be no need, she realized, for him to stay with the company after +the first day or two. + +"You're thinking that we ought to have a New York reputation before +tackling Chicago. There's a lot to be said for that. Still, it works +both ways. A Chicago run would help us in New York. Well, I'll have +to think it over," said Fillmore, importantly, "I'll have to think it +over." + +He mused with drawn brows. + +"All wrong," said Sally. + +"Eh?" + +"Not a bit like it. The lips should be compressed and the forefinger of +the right hand laid in a careworn way against the right temple. You've a +lot to learn. Fill." + +"Oh, stop it!" + +"Fillmore Nicholas," said Sally, "if you knew what pain it gives me to +josh my only brother, you'd be sorry for me. But you know it's for your +good. Now run along and put Ike out of his misery. I know he's waiting +for you with his watch out. 'You do think he'll come, Miss Nicholas?' +were his last words to me as he stepped on the train, and oh, Fill, the +yearning in his voice. 'Why, of course he will, Mr. Schumann,' I said. +'For all his exalted position, my brother is kindliness itself. Of +course he'll come.' 'If I could only think so!' he said with a gulp. 'If +I could only think so. But you know what these managers are. A thousand +calls on their time. They get brooding on their fur coats and forget +everything else.' 'Have no fear, Mr. Schumann,' I said. 'Fillmore +Nicholas is a man of his word.'" + +She would have been willing, for she was a girl who never believed in +sparing herself where it was a question of entertaining her nearest and +dearest, to continue the dialogue, but Fillmore was already moving down +the car, his rigid back a silent protest against sisterly levity. Sally +watched him disappear, then picked up a magazine and began to read. + +She had just finished tracking a story of gripping interest through +a jungle of advertisements, only to find that it was in two parts, of +which the one she was reading was the first, when a voice spoke. + +"How do you do, Miss Nicholas?" + +Into the seat before her, recently released from the weight of the +coming manager, Bruce Carmyle of all people in the world insinuated +himself with that well-bred air of deferential restraint which never +left him. + + + +2 + + + +Sally was considerably startled. Everybody travels nowadays, of course, +and there is nothing really remarkable in finding a man in America whom +you had supposed to be in Europe: but nevertheless she was conscious of +a dream-like sensation, as though the clock had been turned back and a +chapter of her life reopened which she had thought closed for ever. + +"Mr. Carmyle!" she cried. + +If Sally had been constantly in Bruce Carmyle's thoughts since they +had parted on the Paris express, Mr. Carmyle had been very little in +Sally's--so little, indeed, that she had had to search her memory for a +moment before she identified him. + +"We're always meeting on trains, aren't we?" she went on, her composure +returning. "I never expected to see you in America." + +"I came over." + +Sally was tempted to reply that she gathered that, but a sudden +embarrassment curbed her tongue. She had just remembered that at their +last meeting she had been abominably rude to this man. She was never +rude to anyone, without subsequent remorse. She contented herself with a +tame "Yes." + +"Yes," said Mr. Carmyle, "it is a good many years since I have taken +a real holiday. My doctor seemed to think I was a trifle run down. It +seemed a good opportunity to visit America. Everybody," said Mr. Carmyle +oracularly, endeavouring, as he had often done since his ship had left +England, to persuade himself that his object in making the trip had not +been merely to renew his acquaintance with Sally, "everybody ought to +visit America at least once. It is part of one's education." + +"And what are your impressions of our glorious country?" said Sally +rallying. + +Mr. Carmyle seemed glad of the opportunity of lecturing on an impersonal +subject. He, too, though his face had shown no trace of it, had been +embarrassed in the opening stages of the conversation. The sound of his +voice restored him. + +"I have been visiting Chicago," he said after a brief travelogue. + +"Oh!" + +"A wonderful city." + +"I've never seen it. I've come from Detroit." + +"Yes, I heard you were in Detroit." + +Sally's eyes opened. + +"You heard I was in Detroit? Good gracious! How?" + +"I--ah--called at your New York address and made inquiries," said Mr. +Carmyle a little awkwardly. + +"But how did you know where I lived?" + +"My cousin--er--Lancelot told me." + +Sally was silent for a moment. She had much the same feeling that +comes to the man in the detective story who realizes that he is being +shadowed. Even if this almost complete stranger had not actually come to +America in direct pursuit of her, there was no disguising the fact that +he evidently found her an object of considerable interest. It was a +compliment, but Sally was not at all sure that she liked it. Bruce +Carmyle meant nothing to her, and it was rather disturbing to find that +she was apparently of great importance to him. She seized on the mention +of Ginger as a lever for diverting the conversation from its present too +intimate course. + +"How is Mr. Kemp?" she asked. + +Mr. Carmyle's dark face seemed to become a trifle darker. + +"We have had no news of him," he said shortly. + +"No news? How do you mean? You speak as though he had disappeared." + +"He has disappeared!" + +"Good heavens! When?" + +"Shortly after I saw you last." + +"Disappeared!" + +Mr. Carmyle frowned. Sally, watching him, found her antipathy stirring +again. There was something about this man which she had disliked +instinctively from the first, a sort of hardness. + +"But where has he gone to?" + +"I don't know." Mr. Carmyle frowned again. The subject of Ginger was +plainly a sore one. "And I don't want to know," he went on heatedly, +a dull flush rising in the cheeks which Sally was sure he had to shave +twice a day. "I don't care to know. The Family have washed their hands +of him. For the future he may look after himself as best he can. I +believe he is off his head." + +Sally's rebellious temper was well ablaze now, but she fought it down. +She would dearly have loved to give battle to Mr. Carmyle--it was odd, +she felt, how she seemed to have constituted herself Ginger's champion +and protector--but she perceived that, if she wished, as she did, to +hear more of her red-headed friend, he must be humoured and conciliated. + +"But what happened? What was all the trouble about?" + +Mr. Carmyle's eyebrows met. + +"He--insulted his uncle. His uncle Donald. He insulted him--grossly. The +one man in the world he should have made a point of--er--" + +"Keeping in with?" + +"Yes. His future depended upon him." + +"But what did he do?" cried Sally, trying hard to keep a thoroughly +reprehensible joy out of her voice. + +"I have heard no details. My uncle is reticent as to what actually +took place. He invited Lancelot to dinner to discuss his plans, and +it appears that Lancelot--defied him. Defied him! He was rude and +insulting. My uncle refuses to have anything more to do with him. +Apparently the young fool managed to win some money at the tables at +Roville, and this seems to have turned his head completely. My uncle +insists that he is mad. I agree with him. Since the night of that dinner +nothing has been heard of Lancelot." + +Mr. Carmyle broke off to brood once more, and before Sally could speak +the impressive bulk of Fillmore loomed up in the aisle beside them. +Explanations seemed to Fillmore to be in order. He cast a questioning +glance at the mysterious stranger, who, in addition to being in +conversation with his sister, had collared his seat. + +"Oh, hullo, Fill," said Sally. "Fillmore, this is Mr. Carmyle. We met +abroad. My brother Fillmore, Mr. Carmyle." + +Proper introduction having been thus effected, Fillmore approved of Mr. +Carmyle. His air of being someone in particular appealed to him. + +"Strange you meeting again like this," he said affably. + +The porter, who had been making up berths along the car, was now +hovering expectantly in the offing. + +"You two had better go into the smoking room," suggested Sally. "I'm +going to bed." + +She wanted to be alone, to think. Mr. Carmyle's tale of a roused and +revolting Ginger had stirred her. + +The two men went off to the smoking-room, and Sally found an empty seat +and sat down to wait for her berth to be made up. She was aglow with a +curious exhilaration. So Ginger had taken her advice! Excellent Ginger! +She felt proud of him. She also had that feeling of complacency, +amounting almost to sinful pride, which comes to those who give advice +and find it acted upon. She had the emotions of a creator. After all, +had she not created this new Ginger? It was she who had stirred him +up. It was she who had unleashed him. She had changed him from a meek +dependent of the Family to a ravening creature, who went about the place +insulting uncles. + +It was a feat, there was no denying it. It was something attempted, +something done: and by all the rules laid down by the poet it should, +therefore, have earned a night's repose. Yet, Sally, jolted by the +train, which towards the small hours seemed to be trying out some new +buck-and-wing steps of its own invention, slept ill, and presently, as +she lay awake, there came to her bedside the Spectre of Doubt, gaunt and +questioning. Had she, after all, wrought so well? Had she been wise in +tampering with this young man's life? + +"What about it?" said the Spectre of Doubt. + + + +3 + + + +Daylight brought no comforting answer to the question. Breakfast failed +to manufacture an easy mind. Sally got off the train, at the Grand +Central station in a state of remorseful concern. She declined the offer +of Mr. Carmyle to drive her to the boarding-house, and started to walk +there, hoping that the crisp morning air would effect a cure. + +She wondered now how she could ever have looked with approval on her +rash act. She wondered what demon of interference and meddling had +possessed her, to make her blunder into people's lives, upsetting them. +She wondered that she was allowed to go around loose. She was nothing +more nor less than a menace to society. Here was an estimable young man, +obviously the sort of young man who would always have to be assisted +through life by his relatives, and she had deliberately egged him on +to wreck his prospects. She blushed hotly as she remembered that mad +wireless she had sent him from the boat. + +Miserable Ginger! She pictured him, his little stock of money gone, +wandering foot-sore about London, seeking in vain for work; forcing +himself to call on Uncle Donald; being thrown down the front steps by +haughty footmen; sleeping on the Embankment; gazing into the dark waters +of the Thames with the stare of hopelessness; climbing to the parapet +and... + +"Ugh!" said Sally. + +She had arrived at the door of the boarding-house, and Mrs. Meecher was +regarding her with welcoming eyes, little knowing that to all practical +intents and purposes she had slain in his prime a red-headed young +man of amiable manners and--when not ill-advised by meddling, muddling +females--of excellent behaviour. + +Mrs. Meecher was friendly and garrulous. Variety, the journal which, +next to the dog Toto, was the thing she loved best in the world, had +informed her on the Friday morning that Mr. Foster's play had got over +big in Detroit, and that Miss Doland had made every kind of hit. It was +not often that the old alumni of the boarding-house forced their +way after this fashion into the Hall of Fame, and, according to Mrs. +Meecher, the establishment was ringing with the news. That blue ribbon +round Toto's neck was worn in honour of the triumph. There was also, +though you could not see it, a chicken dinner in Toto's interior, by way +of further celebration. + +And was it true that Mr. Fillmore had bought the piece? A great man, was +Mrs. Meecher's verdict. Mr. Faucitt had always said so... + +"Oh, how is Mr. Faucitt?" Sally asked, reproaching herself for having +allowed the pressure of other matters to drive all thoughts of her late +patient from her mind. + +"He's gone," said Mrs. Meecher with such relish that to Sally, in her +morbid condition, the words had only one meaning. She turned white and +clutched at the banisters. + +"Gone!" + +"To England," added Mrs. Meecher. Sally was vastly relieved. + +"Oh, I thought you meant..." + +"Oh no, not that." Mrs. Meecher sighed, for she had been a little +disappointed in the old gentleman, who started out as such a promising +invalid, only to fall away into the dullness of robust health once more. +"He's well enough. I never seen anybody better. You'd think," said Mrs. +Meecher, bearing up with difficulty under her grievance, "you'd +think this here new Spanish influenza was a sort of a tonic or +somep'n, the way he looks now. Of course," she added, trying to find +justification for a respected lodger, "he's had good news. His brother's +dead." + +"What!" + +"Not, I don't mean, that that was good news, far from it, though, come +to think of it, all flesh is as grass and we all got to be prepared for +somep'n of the sort breaking loose...but it seems this here new brother +of his--I didn't know he'd a brother, and I don't suppose you knew he +had a brother. Men are secretive, ain't they!--this brother of his +has left him a parcel of money, and Mr. Faucitt he had to get on the +Wednesday boat quick as he could and go right over to the other side to +look after things. Wind up the estate, I believe they call it. Left in a +awful hurry, he did. Sent his love to you and said he'd write. Funny him +having a brother, now, wasn't it? Not," said Mrs. Meecher, at heart a +reasonable woman, "that folks don't have brothers. I got two myself, one +in Portland, Oregon, and the other goodness knows where he is. But what +I'm trying to say..." + +Sally disengaged herself, and went up to her room. For a brief while the +excitement which comes of hearing good news about those of whom we are +fond acted as a stimulant, and she felt almost cheerful. Dear old Mr. +Faucitt. She was sorry for his brother, of course, though she had never +had the pleasure of his acquaintance and had only just heard that he had +ever existed; but it was nice to think that her old friend's remaining +years would be years of affluence. + +Presently, however, she found her thoughts wandering back into their +melancholy groove. She threw herself wearily on the bed. She was tired +after her bad night. + +But she could not sleep. Remorse kept her awake. Besides, she could hear +Mrs. Meecher prowling disturbingly about the house, apparently in search +of someone, her progress indicated by creaking boards and the strenuous +yapping of Toto. + +Sally turned restlessly, and, having turned remained for a long instant +transfixed and rigid. She had seen something, and what she had seen +was enough to surprise any girl in the privacy of her bedroom. From +underneath the bed there peeped coyly forth an undeniably masculine shoe +and six inches of a grey trouser-leg. + +Sally bounded to the floor. She was a girl of courage, and she meant to +probe this matter thoroughly. + +"What are you doing under my bed?" + +The question was a reasonable one, and evidently seemed to the intruder +to deserve an answer. There was a muffled sneeze, and he began to crawl +out. + +The shoe came first. Then the legs. Then a sturdy body in a dusty coat. +And finally there flashed on Sally's fascinated gaze a head of so nearly +the maximum redness that it could only belong to one person in the +world. + +"Ginger!" + +Mr. Lancelot Kemp, on all fours, blinked up at her. + +"Oh, hullo!" he said. + + + + +CHAPTER IX. GINGER BECOMES A RIGHT-HAND MAN + + + +It was not till she saw him actually standing there before her with his +hair rumpled and a large smut on the tip of his nose, that Sally really +understood how profoundly troubled she had been about this young man, +and how vivid had been that vision of him bobbing about on the waters +of the Thames, a cold and unappreciated corpse. She was a girl of keen +imagination, and she had allowed her imagination to riot unchecked. +Astonishment, therefore, at the extraordinary fact of his being there +was for the moment thrust aside by relief. Never before in her life had +she experienced such an overwhelming rush of exhilaration. She flung +herself into a chair and burst into a screech of laughter which even to +her own ears sounded strange. It struck Ginger as hysterical. + +"I say, you know!" said Ginger, as the merriment showed no signs of +abating. Ginger was concerned. Nasty shock for a girl, finding blighters +under her bed. + +Sally sat up, gurgling, and wiped her eyes. + +"Oh, I am glad to see you," she gasped. + +"No, really?" said Ginger, gratified. "That's fine." It occurred to him +that some sort of apology would be a graceful act. "I say, you know, +awfully sorry. About barging in here, I mean. Never dreamed it was your +room. Unoccupied, I thought." + +"Don't mention it. I ought not to have disturbed you. You were having a +nice sleep, of course. Do you always sleep on the floor?" + +"It was like this..." + +"Of course, if you're wearing it for ornament, as a sort of +beauty-spot," said Sally, "all right. But in case you don't know, you've +a smut on your nose." + +"Oh, my aunt! Not really?" + +"Now would I deceive you on an important point like that?" + +"Do you mind if I have a look in the glass?" + +"Certainly, if you can stand it." + +Ginger moved hurriedly to the dressing-table. + +"You're perfectly right," he announced, applying his handkerchief. + +"I thought I was. I'm very quick at noticing things." + +"My hair's a bit rumpled, too." + +"Very much so." + +"You take my tip," said Ginger, earnestly, "and never lie about under +beds. There's nothing in it." + +"That reminds me. You won't be offended if I asked you something?" + +"No, no. Go ahead." + +"It's rather an impertinent question. You may resent it." + +"No, no." + +"Well, then, what were you doing under my bed?" + +"Oh, under your bed?" + +"Yes. Under my bed. This. It's a bed, you know. Mine. My bed. You were +under it. Why? Or putting it another way, why were you under my bed?" + +"I was hiding." + +"Playing hide-and-seek? That explains it." + +"Mrs. What's-her-name--Beecher--Meecher--was after me." + +Sally shook her head disapprovingly. + +"You mustn't encourage Mrs. Meecher in these childish pastimes. It +unsettles her." + +Ginger passed an agitated hand over his forehead. + +"It's like this..." + +"I hate to keep criticizing your appearance," said Sally, "and +personally I like it; but, when you clutched your brow just then, you +put about a pound of dust on it. Your hands are probably grubby." + +Ginger inspected them. + +"They are!" + +"Why not make a really good job of it and have a wash?" + +"Do you mind?" + +"I'd prefer it." + +"Thanks awfully. I mean to say it's your basin, you know, and all that. +What I mean is, seem to be making myself pretty well at home." + +"Oh, no." + +"Touching the matter of soap..." + +"Use mine. We Americans are famous for our hospitality." + +"Thanks awfully." + +"The towel is on your right." + +"Thanks awfully." + +"And I've a clothes brush in my bag." + +"Thanks awfully." + +Splashing followed like a sea-lion taking a dip. "Now, then," said +Sally, "why were you hiding from Mrs. Meecher?" + +A careworn, almost hunted look came into Ginger's face. "I say, you +know, that woman is rather by way of being one of the lads, what! Scares +me! Word was brought that she was on the prowl, so it seemed to me a +judicious move to take cover till she sort of blew over. If she'd found +me, she'd have made me take that dog of hers for a walk." + +"Toto?" + +"Toto. You know," said Ginger, with a strong sense of injury, "no dog's +got a right to be a dog like that. I don't suppose there's anyone +keener on dogs than I am, but a thing like a woolly rat." He shuddered +slightly. "Well, one hates to be seen about with it in the public +streets." + +"Why couldn't you have refused in a firm but gentlemanly manner to take +Toto out?" + +"Ah! There you rather touch the spot. You see, the fact of the matter +is, I'm a bit behind with the rent, and that makes it rather hard to +take what you might call a firm stand." + +"But how can you be behind with the rent? I only left here the Saturday +before last and you weren't in the place then. You can't have been here +more than a week." + +"I've been here just a week. That's the week I'm behind with." + +"But why? You were a millionaire when I left you at Roville." + +"Well, the fact of the matter is, I went back to the tables that night +and lost a goodish bit of what I'd won. And, somehow or another, when I +got to America, the stuff seemed to slip away." + +"What made you come to America at all?" said Sally, asking the question +which, she felt, any sensible person would have asked at the opening of +the conversation. + +One of his familiar blushes raced over Ginger's face. "Oh, I thought I +would. Land of opportunity, you know." + +"Have you managed to find any of the opportunities yet?" + +"Well, I have got a job of sorts, I'm a waiter at a rummy little place +on Second Avenue. The salary isn't big, but I'd have wangled enough out +of it to pay last week's rent, only they docked me a goodish bit for +breaking plates and what not. The fact is, I'm making rather a hash of +it." + +"Oh, Ginger! You oughtn't to be a waiter!" + +"That's what the boss seems to think." + +"I mean, you ought to be doing something ever so much better." + +"But what? You've no notion how well all these blighters here seem to +be able to get along without my help. I've tramped all over the place, +offering my services, but they all say they'll try to carry on as they +are." + +Sally reflected. + +"I know!" + +"What?" + +"I'll make Fillmore give you a job. I wonder I didn't think of it +before." + +"Fillmore?" + +"My brother. Yes, he'll be able to use you." + +"What as?" + +Sally considered. + +"As a--as a--oh, as his right-hand man." + +"Does he want a right-hand man?" + +"Sure to. He's a young fellow trying to get along. Sure to want a +right-hand man." + +"'M yes," said Ginger reflectively. "Of course, I've never been a +right-hand man, you know." + +"Oh, you'd pick it up. I'll take you round to him now. He's staying at +the Astor." + +"There's just one thing," said Ginger. + +"What's that?" + +"I might make a hash of it." + +"Heavens, Ginger! There must be something in this world that you +wouldn't make a hash of. Don't stand arguing any longer. Are you dry? +and clean? Very well, then. Let's be off." + +"Right ho." + +Ginger took a step towards the door, then paused, rigid, with one leg in +the air, as though some spell had been cast upon him. From the passage +outside there had sounded a shrill yapping. Ginger looked at Sally. Then +he looked--longingly--at the bed. + +"Don't be such a coward," said Sally, severely. + +"Yes, but..." + +"How much do you owe Mrs. Meecher?" + +"Round about twelve dollars, I think it is." + +"I'll pay her." + +Ginger flushed awkwardly. + +"No, I'm hanged if you will! I mean," he stammered, "it's frightfully +good of you and all that, and I can't tell you how grateful I am, but +honestly, I couldn't..." + +Sally did not press the point. She liked him the better for a rugged +independence, which in the days of his impecuniousness her brother +Fillmore had never dreamed of exhibiting. + +"Very well," she said. "Have it your own way. Proud. That's me all over, +Mabel. Ginger!" She broke off sharply. "Pull yourself together. Where is +your manly spirit? I'd be ashamed to be such a coward." + +"Awfully sorry, but, honestly, that woolly dog..." + +"Never mind the dog. I'll see you through." + +They came out into the passage almost on top of Toto, who was stalking +phantom rats. Mrs. Meecher was manoeuvring in the background. Her face +lit up grimly at the sight of Ginger. + +"Mister Kemp! I been looking for you." + +Sally intervened brightly. + +"Oh, Mrs. Meecher," she said, shepherding her young charge through the +danger zone, "I was so surprised to meet Mr. Kemp here. He is a great +friend of mine. We met in France. We're going off now to have a long +talk about old times, and then I'm taking him to see my brother..." + +"Toto..." + +"Dear little thing! You ought to take him for a walk," said Sally. "It's +a lovely day. Mr. Kemp was saying just now that he would have liked to +take him, but we're rather in a hurry and shall probably have to get +into a taxi. You've no idea how busy my brother is just now. If we're +late, he'll never forgive us." + +She passed on down the stairs, leaving Mrs. Meecher dissatisfied +but irresolute. There was something about Sally which even in her +pre-wealthy days had always baffled Mrs. Meecher and cramped her style, +and now that she was rich and independent she inspired in the chatelaine +of the boarding-house an emotion which was almost awe. The front door +had closed before Mrs. Meecher had collected her faculties; and Ginger, +pausing on the sidewalk, drew a long breath. + +"You know, you're wonderful!" he said, regarding Sally with unconcealed +admiration. + +She accepted the compliment composedly. + +"Now we'll go and hunt up Fillmore," she said. "But there's no need to +hurry, of course, really. We'll go for a walk first, and then call at +the Astor and make him give us lunch. I want to hear all about you. I've +heard something already. I met your cousin, Mr. Carmyle. He was on the +train coming from Detroit. Did you know that he was in America?" + +"No, I've--er--rather lost touch with the Family." + +"So I gathered from Mr. Carmyle. And I feel hideously responsible. It +was all through me that all this happened." + +"Oh, no." + +"Of course it was. I made you what you are to-day--I hope I'm +satisfied--I dragged and dragged you down until the soul within you +died, so to speak. I know perfectly well that you wouldn't have dreamed +of savaging the Family as you seem to have done if it hadn't been for +what I said to you at Roville. Ginger, tell me, what did happen? I'm +dying to know. Mr. Carmyle said you insulted your uncle!" + +"Donald. Yes, we did have a bit of a scrap, as a matter of fact. He made +me go out to dinner with him and we--er--sort of disagreed. To start +with, he wanted me to apologize to old Scrymgeour, and I rather gave it +a miss." + +"Noble fellow!" + +"Scrymgeour?" + +"No, silly! You." + +"Oh, ah!" Ginger blushed. "And then there was all that about the soup, +you know." + +"How do you mean, 'all that about the soup'? What about the soup? What +soup?" + +"Well, things sort of hotted up a bit when the soup arrived." + +"I don't understand." + +"I mean, the trouble seemed to start, as it were, when the waiter had +finished ladling out the mulligatawny. Thick soup, you know." + +"I know mulligatawny is a thick soup. Yes?" + +"Well, my old uncle--I'm not blaming him, don't you know--more his +misfortune than his fault--I can see that now--but he's got a heavy +moustache. Like a walrus, rather, and he's a bit apt to inhale the stuff +through it. And I--well, I asked him not to. It was just a suggestion, +you know. He cut up fairly rough, and by the time the fish came round +we were more or less down on the mat chewing holes in one another. My +fault, probably. I wasn't feeling particularly well-disposed towards +the Family that night. I'd just had a talk with Bruce--my cousin, you +know--in Piccadilly, and that had rather got the wind up me. Bruce +always seems to get on my nerves a bit somehow and--Uncle Donald asking +me to dinner and all that. By the way, did you get the books?" + +"What books?" + +"Bruce said he wanted to send you some books. That was why I gave him +your address." Sally stared. + +"He never sent me any books." + +"Well, he said he was going to, and I had to tell him where to send +them." + +Sally walked on, a little thoughtfully. She was not a vain girl, but it +was impossible not to perceive in the light of this fresh evidence that +Mr. Carmyle had made a journey of three thousand miles with the sole +object of renewing his acquaintance with her. It did not matter, of +course, but it was vaguely disturbing. No girl cares to be dogged by a +man she rather dislikes. + +"Go on telling me about your uncle," she said. + +"Well, there's not much more to tell. I'd happened to get that wireless +of yours just before I started out to dinner with him, and I was more or +less feeling that I wasn't going to stand any rot from the Family. I'd +got to the fish course, hadn't I? Well, we managed to get through that +somehow, but we didn't survive the fillet steak. One thing seemed to +lead to another, and the show sort of bust up. He called me a good many +things, and I got a bit fed-up, and finally I told him I hadn't any more +use for the Family and was going to start out on my own. And--well, I +did, don't you know. And here I am." + +Sally listened to this saga breathlessly. More than ever did she feel +responsible for her young protege, and any faint qualms which she had +entertained as to the wisdom of transferring practically the whole +of her patrimony to the care of so erratic a financier as her brother +vanished. It was her plain duty to see that Ginger was started well in +the race of life, and Fillmore was going to come in uncommonly handy. + +"We'll go to the Astor now," she said, "and I'll introduce you to +Fillmore. He's a theatrical manager and he's sure to have something for +you." + +"It's awfully good of you to bother about me." + +"Ginger," said Sally, "I regard you as a grandson. Hail that cab, will +you?" + + + + +CHAPTER X. SALLY IN THE SHADOWS + + + +1 + + + +It seemed to Sally in the weeks that followed her reunion with Ginger +Kemp that a sort of golden age had set in. On all the frontiers of her +little kingdom there was peace and prosperity, and she woke each morning +in a world so neatly smoothed and ironed out that the most captious +pessimist could hardly have found anything in it to criticize. + +True, Gerald was still a thousand miles away. Going to Chicago to +superintend the opening of "The Primrose Way"; for Fillmore had acceded +to his friend Ike's suggestion in the matter of producing it first in +Chicago, and he had been called in by a distracted manager to revise the +work of a brother dramatist, whose comedy was in difficulties at one of +the theatres in that city; and this meant he would have to remain on +the spot for some time to come. It was disappointing, for Sally had been +looking forward to having him back in New York in a few days; but she +refused to allow herself to be depressed. Life as a whole was much +too satisfactory for that. Life indeed, in every other respect, seemed +perfect. Fillmore was going strong; Ginger was off her conscience; she +had found an apartment; her new hat suited her; and "The Primrose Way" +was a tremendous success. Chicago, it appeared from Fillmore's account, +was paying little attention to anything except "The Primrose Way." +National problems had ceased to interest the citizens. Local problems +left them cold. Their minds were riveted to the exclusion of all else +on the problem of how to secure seats. The production of the piece, +according to Fillmore, had been the most terrific experience that had +come to stir Chicago since the great fire. + +Of all these satisfactory happenings, the most satisfactory, to Sally's +thinking, was the fact that the problem of Ginger's future had been +solved. Ginger had entered the service of the Fillmore Nicholas +Theatrical Enterprises Ltd. (Managing Director, Fillmore +Nicholas)--Fillmore would have made the title longer, only that was all +that would go on the brass plate--and was to be found daily in the outer +office, his duties consisting mainly, it seemed, in reading the evening +papers. What exactly he was, even Ginger hardly knew. Sometimes he felt +like the man at the wheel, sometimes like a glorified office boy, and +not so very glorified at that. For the most part he had to prevent the +mob rushing and getting at Fillmore, who sat in semi-regal state in the +inner office pondering great schemes. + +But, though there might be an occasional passing uncertainty in Ginger's +mind as to just what he was supposed to be doing in exchange for the +fifty dollars he drew every Friday, there was nothing uncertain about +his gratitude to Sally for having pulled the strings and enabled him to +do it. He tried to thank her every time they met, and nowadays they +were meeting frequently; for Ginger was helping her to furnish her new +apartment. In this task, he spared no efforts. He said that it kept him +in condition. + +"And what I mean to say is," said Ginger, pausing in the act of carrying +a massive easy chair to the third spot which Sally had selected in the +last ten minutes, "if I didn't sweat about a bit and help you after the +way you got me that job..." + +"Ginger, desist," said Sally. + +"Yes, but honestly..." + +"If you don't stop it, I'll make you move that chair into the next +room." + +"Shall I?" Ginger rubbed his blistered hands and took a new grip. +"Anything you say." + +"Silly! Of course not. The only other rooms are my bedroom, the bathroom +and the kitchen. What on earth would I want a great lumbering chair in +them for? All the same, I believe the first we chose was the best." + +"Back she goes, then, what?" + +Sally reflected frowningly. This business of setting up house was +causing her much thought. + +"No," she decided. "By the window is better." She looked at him +remorsefully. "I'm giving you a lot of trouble." + +"Trouble!" Ginger, accompanied by a chair, staggered across the room. +"The way I look at it is this." He wiped a bead of perspiration from his +freckled forehead. "You got me that job, and..." + +"Stop!" + +"Right ho... Still, you did, you know." + +Sally sat down in the armchair and stretched herself. Watching Ginger +work had given her a vicarious fatigue. She surveyed the room proudly. +It was certainly beginning to look cosy. The pictures were up, the +carpet down, the furniture very neatly in order. For almost the first +time in her life she had the restful sensation of being at home. She had +always longed, during the past three years of boarding-house existence, +for a settled abode, a place where she could lock the door on herself +and be alone. The apartment was small, but it was undeniably a haven. +She looked about her and could see no flaw in it... except... She had a +sudden sense of something missing. + +"Hullo!" she said. "Where's that photograph of me? I'm sure I put it on +the mantelpiece yesterday." + +His exertions seemed to have brought the blood to Ginger's face. He was +a rich red. He inspected the mantelpiece narrowly. + +"No. No photograph here." + +"I know there isn't. But it was there yesterday. Or was it? I know I +meant to put it there. Perhaps I forgot. It's the most beautiful thing +you ever saw. Not a bit like me; but what of that? They touch 'em up in +the dark-room, you know. I value it because it looks the way I should +like to look if I could." + +"I've never had a beautiful photograph taken of myself," said Ginger, +solemnly, with gentle regret. + +"Cheer up!" + +"Oh, I don't mind. I only mentioned..." + +"Ginger," said Sally, "pardon my interrupting your remarks, which I know +are valuable, but this chair is--not--right! It ought to be where it was +at the beginning. Could you give your imitation of a pack-mule just +once more? And after that I'll make you some tea. If there's any tea--or +milk--or cups." + +"There are cups all right. I know, because I smashed two the day before +yesterday. I'll nip round the corner for some milk, shall I?" + +"Yes, please nip. All this hard work has taken it out of me terribly." + +Over the tea-table Sally became inquisitive. + +"What I can't understand about this job of yours. Ginger--which as you +are just about to observe, I was noble enough to secure for you--is the +amount of leisure that seems to go with it. How is it that you are able +to spend your valuable time--Fillmore's valuable time, rather--juggling +with my furniture every day?" + +"Oh, I can usually get off." + +"But oughtn't you to be at your post doing--whatever it is you do? What +do you do?" + +Ginger stirred his tea thoughtfully and gave his mind to the question. + +"Well, I sort of mess about, you know." He pondered. "I interview divers +blighters and tell 'em your brother is out and take their names and +addresses and... oh, all that sort of thing." + +"Does Fillmore consult you much?" + +"He lets me read some of the plays that are sent in. Awful tosh most of +them. Sometimes he sends me off to a vaudeville house of an evening." + +"As a treat?" + +"To see some special act, you know. To report on it. In case he might +want to use it for this revue of his." + +"Which revue?" + +"Didn't you know he was going to put on a revue? Oh, rather. A whacking +big affair. Going to cut out the Follies and all that sort of thing." + +"But--my goodness!" Sally was alarmed. It was just like Fillmore, she +felt, to go branching out into these expensive schemes when he ought to +be moving warily and trying to consolidate the small success he had had. +All his life he had thought in millions where the prudent man would have +been content with hundreds. An inexhaustible fount of optimism bubbled +eternally within him. "That's rather ambitious," she said. + +"Yes. Ambitious sort of cove, your brother. Quite the Napoleon." + +"I shall have to talk to him," said Sally decidedly. She was annoyed +with Fillmore. Everything had been going so beautifully, with everybody +peaceful and happy and prosperous and no anxiety anywhere, till he had +spoiled things. Now she would have to start worrying again. + +"Of course," argued Ginger, "there's money in revues. Over in London +fellows make pots out of them." + +Sally shook her head. + +"It won't do," she said. "And I'll tell you another thing that won't do. +This armchair. Of course it ought to be over by the window. You can see +that yourself, can't you." + +"Absolutely!" said Ginger, patiently preparing for action once more. + + + +2 + + + +Sally's anxiety with regard to her ebullient brother was not lessened by +the receipt shortly afterwards of a telegram from Miss Winch in Chicago. + +Have you been feeding Fillmore meat? + +the telegram ran: and, while Sally could not have claimed that she +completely understood it, there was a sinister suggestion about +the message which decided her to wait no longer before making +investigations. She tore herself away from the joys of furnishing and +went round to the headquarters of the Fillmore Nicholas Theatrical +Enterprises Ltd. (Managing Director, Fillmore Nicholas) without delay. + +Ginger, she discovered on arrival, was absent from his customary post, +his place in the outer office being taken by a lad of tender years and +pimply exterior, who thawed and cast off a proud reserve on hearing +Sally's name, and told her to walk right in. Sally walked right in, and +found Fillmore with his feet on an untidy desk, studying what appeared +to be costume-designs. + +"Ah, Sally!" he said in the distrait, tired voice which speaks of vast +preoccupations. Prosperity was still putting in its silent, deadly work +on the Hope of the American Theatre. What, even at as late an epoch as +the return from Detroit, had been merely a smooth fullness around the +angle of the jaw was now frankly and without disguise a double chin. He +was wearing a new waistcoat and it was unbuttoned. "I am rather busy," +he went on. "Always glad to see you, but I am rather busy. I have a +hundred things to attend to." + +"Well, attend to me. That'll only make a hundred and one. Fill, what's +all this I hear about a revue?" + +Fillmore looked as like a small boy caught in the act of stealing jam +as it is possible for a great theatrical manager to look. He had been +wondering in his darker moments what Sally would say about that project +when she heard of it, and he had hoped that she would not hear of it +until all the preparations were so complete that interference would be +impossible. He was extremely fond of Sally, but there was, he knew, +a lamentable vein of caution in her make-up which might lead her to +criticize. And how can your man of affairs carry on if women are buzzing +round criticizing all the time? He picked up a pen and put it down; +buttoned his waistcoat and unbuttoned it; and scratched his ear with one +of the costume-designs. + +"Oh yes, the revue!" + +"It's no good saying 'Oh yes'! You know perfectly well it's a crazy +idea." + +"Really... these business matters... this interference..." + +"I don't want to run your affairs for you, Fill, but that money of mine +does make me a sort of partner, I suppose, and I think I have a right to +raise a loud yell of agony when I see you risking it on a..." + +"Pardon me," said Fillmore loftily, looking happier. "Let me explain. +Women never understand business matters. Your money is tied up +exclusively in 'The Primrose Way,' which, as you know, is a tremendous +success. You have nothing whatever to worry about as regards any new +production I may make." + +"I'm not worrying about the money. I'm worrying about you." + +A tolerant smile played about the lower slopes of Fillmore's face. + +"Don't be alarmed about me. I'm all right." + +"You aren't all right. You've no business, when you've only just got +started as a manager, to be rushing into an enormous production like +this. You can't afford it." + +"My dear child, as I said before, women cannot understand these things. +A man in my position can always command money for a new venture." + +"Do you mean to say you have found somebody silly enough to put up +money?" + +"Certainly. I don't know that there is any secret about it. Your +friend, Mr. Carmyle, has taken an interest in some of my forthcoming +productions." + +"What!" Sally had been disturbed before, but she was aghast now. + +This was something she had never anticipated. Bruce Carmyle seemed to be +creeping into her life like an advancing tide. There appeared to be no +eluding him. Wherever she turned, there he was, and she could do nothing +but rage impotently. The situation was becoming impossible. + +Fillmore misinterpreted the note of dismay in her voice. + +"It's quite all right," he assured her. "He's a very rich man. Large +private means, besides his big income. Even if anything goes wrong..." + +"It isn't that. It's..." + +The hopelessness of explaining to Fillmore stopped Sally. And while she +was chafing at this new complication which had come to upset the orderly +routine of her life there was an outburst of voices in the other office. +Ginger's understudy seemed to be endeavouring to convince somebody that +the Big Chief was engaged and not to be intruded upon. In this he was +unsuccessful, for the door opened tempestuously and Miss Winch sailed +in. + +"Fillmore, you poor nut," said Miss Winch, for though she might wrap up +her meaning somewhat obscurely in her telegraphic communications, when +it came to the spoken word she was directness itself, "stop picking +straws in your hair and listen to me. You're dippy!" + +The last time Sally had seen Fillmore's fiancee, she had been impressed +by her imperturbable calm. Miss Winch, in Detroit, had seemed a girl +whom nothing could ruffle. That she had lapsed now from this serene +placidity, struck Sally as ominous. Slightly though she knew her, she +felt that it could be no ordinary happening that had so animated her +sister-in-law-to-be. + +"Ah! Here you are!" said Fillmore. He had started to his feet +indignantly at the opening of the door, like a lion bearded in its den, +but calm had returned when he saw who the intruder was. + +"Yes, here I am!" Miss Winch dropped despairingly into a swivel-chair, +and endeavoured to restore herself with a stick of chewing-gum. +"Fillmore, darling, you're the sweetest thing on earth, and I love you, +but on present form you could just walk straight into Bloomingdale and +they'd give you the royal suite." + +"My dear girl..." + +"What do you think?" demanded Miss Winch, turning to Sally. + +"I've just been telling him," said Sally, welcoming this ally, "I +think it's absurd at this stage of things for him to put on an enormous +revue..." + +"Revue?" Miss Winch stopped in the act of gnawing her gum. "What revue?" +She flung up her arms. "I shall have to swallow this gum," she said. +"You can't chew with your head going round. Are you putting on a revue +too?" + +Fillmore was buttoning and unbuttoning his waistcoat. He had a hounded +look. + +"Certainly, certainly," he replied in a tone of some feverishness. "I +wish you girls would leave me to manage..." + +"Dippy!" said Miss Winch once more. "Telegraphic address: Tea-Pot, +Matteawan." She swivelled round to Sally again. "Say, listen! This boy +must be stopped. We must form a gang in his best interests and get +him put away. What do you think he proposes doing? I'll give you three +guesses. Oh, what's the use? You'd never hit it. This poor wandering lad +has got it all fixed up to star me--me--in a new show!" + +Fillmore removed a hand from his waistcoat buttons and waved it +protestingly. + +"I have used my own judgment..." + +"Yes, sir!" proceeded Miss Winch, riding over the interruption. "That's +what he's planning to spring on an unsuspicious public. I'm sitting +peacefully in my room at the hotel in Chicago, pronging a few cents' +worth of scrambled eggs and reading the morning paper, when the +telephone rings. Gentleman below would like to see me. Oh, ask him to +wait. Business of flinging on a few clothes. Down in elevator. Bright +sunrise effects in lobby." + +"What on earth do you mean?" + +"The gentleman had a head of red hair which had to be seen to be +believed," explained Miss Winch. "Lit up the lobby. Management had +switched off all the electrics for sake of economy. An Englishman he +was. Nice fellow. Named Kemp." + +"Oh, is Ginger in Chicago?" said Sally. "I wondered why he wasn't on his +little chair in the outer office. + +"I sent Kemp to Chicago," said Fillmore, "to have a look at the show. It +is my policy, if I am unable to pay periodical visits myself, to send a +representative..." + +"Save it up for the long winter evenings," advised Miss Winch, cutting +in on this statement of managerial tactics. "Mr. Kemp may have been +there to look at the show, but his chief reason for coming was to tell +me to beat it back to New York to enter into my kingdom. Fillmore wanted +me on the spot, he told me, so that I could sit around in this office +here, interviewing my supporting company. Me! Can you or can you not," +inquired Miss Winch frankly, "tie it?" + +"Well..." Sally hesitated. + +"Don't say it! I know it just as well as you do. It's too sad for +words." + +"You persist in underestimating your abilities, Gladys," said Fillmore +reproachfully. "I have had a certain amount of experience in theatrical +matters--I have seen a good deal of acting--and I assure you that as a +character-actress you..." + +Miss Winch rose swiftly from her seat, kissed Fillmore energetically, +and sat down again. She produced another stick of chewing-gum, then +shook her head and replaced it in her bag. + +"You're a darling old thing to talk like that," she said, "and I hate to +wake you out of your daydreams, but, honestly, Fillmore, dear, do just +step out of the padded cell for one moment and listen to reason. I know +exactly what has been passing in your poor disordered bean. You took +Elsa Doland out of a minor part and made her a star overnight. She goes +to Chicago, and the critics and everybody else rave about her. As a +matter of fact," she said to Sally with enthusiasm, for hers was an +honest and generous nature, "you can't realize, not having seen her +play there, what an amazing hit she has made. She really is a sensation. +Everybody says she's going to be the biggest thing on record. Very +well, then, what does Fillmore do? The poor fish claps his hand to his +forehead and cries 'Gadzooks! An idea! I've done it before, I'll do it +again. I'm the fellow who can make a star out of anything.' And he picks +on me!" + +"My dear girl..." + +"Now, the flaw in the scheme is this. Elsa is a genius, and if he hadn't +made her a star somebody else would have done. But little Gladys? That's +something else again." She turned to Sally. "You've seen me in action, +and let me tell you you've seen me at my best. Give me a maid's part, +with a tray to carry on in act one and a couple of 'Yes, madam's' in act +two, and I'm there! Ellen Terry hasn't anything on me when it comes to +saying 'Yes, madam,' and I'm willing to back myself for gold, notes, +or lima beans against Sarah Bernhardt as a tray-carrier. But there I +finish. That lets me out. And anybody who thinks otherwise is going to +lose a lot of money. Between ourselves the only thing I can do really +well is to cook..." + +"My dear Gladys!" cried Fillmore revolted. + +"I'm a heaven-born cook, and I don't mind notifying the world to that +effect. I can cook a chicken casserole so that you would leave home and +mother for it. Also my English pork-pies! One of these days I'll take +an afternoon off and assemble one for you. You'd be surprised! But +acting--no. I can't do it, and I don't want to do it. I only went on the +stage for fun, and my idea of fun isn't to plough through a star part +with all the critics waving their axes in the front row, and me knowing +all the time that it's taking money out of Fillmore's bankroll that +ought to be going towards buying the little home with stationary +wash-tubs... Well, that's that, Fillmore, old darling. I thought I'd +just mention it." + +Sally could not help being sorry for Fillmore. He was sitting with his +chin on his hands, staring moodily before him--Napoleon at Elba. It was +plain that this project of taking Miss Winch by the scruff of the neck +and hurling her to the heights had been very near his heart. + +"If that's how you feel," he said in a stricken voice, "there is nothing +more to say." + +"Oh, yes there is. We will now talk about this revue of yours. It's +off!" + +Fillmore bounded to his feet; he thumped the desk with a well-nourished +fist. A man can stand just so much. + +"It is not off! Great heavens! It's too much! I will not put up with +this interference with my business concerns. I will not be tied and +hampered. Here am I, a man of broad vision and... and... broad vision... +I form my plans... my plans... I form them... I shape my schemes... and +what happens? A horde of girls flock into my private office while I +am endeavouring to concentrate... and concentrate... I won't stand it. +Advice, yes. Interference, no. I... I... I... and kindly remember that!" + +The door closed with a bang. A fainter detonation announced the +whirlwind passage through the outer office. Footsteps died away down the +corridor. + +Sally looked at Miss Winch, stunned. A roused and militant Fillmore was +new to her. + +Miss Winch took out the stick of chewing-gum again and unwrapped it. + +"Isn't he cute!" she said. "I hope he doesn't get the soft kind," she +murmured, chewing reflectively. + +"The soft kind." + +"He'll be back soon with a box of candy," explained Miss Winch, "and he +will get that sloshy, creamy sort, though I keep telling him I like the +other. Well, one thing's certain. Fillmore's got it up his nose. He's +beginning to hop about and sing in the sunlight. It's going to be hard +work to get that boy down to earth again." Miss Winch heaved a gentle +sigh. "I should like him to have enough left in the old stocking to +pay the first year's rent when the wedding bells ring out." She bit +meditatively on her chewing-gum. "Not," she said, "that it matters. I'd +be just as happy in two rooms and a kitchenette, so long as Fillmore +was there. You've no notion how dippy I am about him." Her freckled face +glowed. "He grows on me like a darned drug. And the funny thing is that +I keep right on admiring him though I can see all the while that he's +the most perfect chump. He is a chump, you know. That's what I love +about him. That and the way his ears wiggle when he gets excited. Chumps +always make the best husbands. When you marry, Sally, grab a chump. +Tap his forehead first, and if it rings solid, don't hesitate. All the +unhappy marriages come from the husband having brains. What good are +brains to a man? They only unsettle him." She broke off and scrutinized +Sally closely. "Say, what do you do with your skin?" + +She spoke with solemn earnestness which made Sally laugh. + +"What do I do with my skin? I just carry it around with me." + +"Well," said Miss Winch enviously, "I wish I could train my darned fool +of a complexion to get that way. Freckles are the devil. When I was +eight I had the finest collection in the Middle West, and I've been +adding to it right along. Some folks say lemon-juice'll cure 'em. Mine +lap up all I give 'em and ask for more. There's only one way of getting +rid of freckles, and that is to saw the head off at the neck." + +"But why do you want to get rid of them?" + +"Why? Because a sensitive girl, anxious to retain her future husband's +love, doesn't enjoy going about looking like something out of a dime +museum." + +"How absurd! Fillmore worships freckles." + +"Did he tell you so?" asked Miss Winch eagerly. + +"Not in so many words, but you can see it in his eye." + +"Well, he certainly asked me to marry him, knowing all about them, I +will say that. And, what's more, I don't think feminine loveliness +means much to Fillmore, or he'd never have picked on me. Still, it is +calculated to give a girl a jar, you must admit, when she picks up a +magazine and reads an advertisement of a face-cream beginning, 'Your +husband is growing cold to you. Can you blame him? Have you really tried +to cure those unsightly blemishes?'--meaning what I've got. Still, I +haven't noticed Fillmore growing cold to me, so maybe it's all right." + +It was a subdued Sally who received Ginger when he called at her +apartment a few days later on his return from Chicago. It seemed to her, +thinking over the recent scene, that matters were even worse than +she had feared. This absurd revue, which she had looked on as a mere +isolated outbreak of foolishness, was, it would appear, only a specimen +of the sort of thing her misguided brother proposed to do, a sample +selected at random from a wholesale lot of frantic schemes. Fillmore, +there was no longer any room for doubt, was preparing to express +his great soul on a vast scale. And she could not dissuade him. A +humiliating thought. She had grown so accustomed through the years to +being the dominating mind that this revolt from her authority made her +feel helpless and inadequate. Her self-confidence was shaken. + +And Bruce Carmyle was financing him... It was illogical, but Sally could +not help feeling that when--she had not the optimism to say "if"--he +lost his money, she would somehow be under an obligation to him, as +if the disaster had been her fault. She disliked, with a whole-hearted +intensity, the thought of being under an obligation to Mr. Carmyle. + +Ginger said he had looked in to inspect the furniture on the chance that +Sally might want it shifted again: but Sally had no criticisms to make +on that subject. Weightier matters occupied her mind. She sat Ginger +down in the armchair and started to pour out her troubles. It soothed +her to talk to him. In a world which had somehow become chaotic again +after an all too brief period of peace, he was solid and consoling. + +"I shouldn't worry," observed Ginger with Winch-like calm, when she had +finished drawing for him the picture of a Fillmore rampant against a +background of expensive revues. Sally nearly shook him. + +"It's all very well to tell me not to worry," she cried. "How can I help +worrying? Fillmore's simply a baby, and he's just playing the fool. He +has lost his head completely. And I can't stop him! That is the awful +part of it. I used to be able to look him in the eye, and he would +wag his tail and crawl back into his basket, but now I seem to have no +influence at all over him. He just snorts and goes on running round in +circles, breathing fire." + +Ginger did not abandon his attempts to indicate the silver lining. + +"I think you are making too much of all this, you know. I mean to say, +it's quite likely he's found some mug... what I mean is, it's just +possible that your brother isn't standing the entire racket himself. +Perhaps some rich Johnnie has breezed along with a pot of money. It +often happens like that, you know. You read in the paper that some +manager or other is putting on some show or other, when really the chap +who's actually supplying the pieces of eight is some anonymous lad in +the background." + +"That is just what has happened, and it makes it worse than ever. +Fillmore tells me that your cousin, Mr. Carmyle, is providing the +money." + +This did interest Ginger. He sat up with a jerk. + +"Oh, I say!" he exclaimed. + +"Yes," said Sally, still agitated but pleased that she had at last +shaken him out of his trying attitude of detachment. + +Ginger was scowling. + +"That's a bit off," he observed. + +"I think so, too." + +"I don't like that." + +"Nor do I." + +"Do you know what I think?" said Ginger, ever a man of plain speech and +a reckless plunger into delicate subjects. "The blighter's in love with +you." + +Sally flushed. After examining the evidence before her, she had reached +the same conclusion in the privacy of her thoughts, but it embarrassed +her to hear the thing put into bald words. + +"I know Bruce," continued Ginger, "and, believe me, he isn't the sort of +cove to take any kind of flutter without a jolly good motive. Of course, +he's got tons of money. His old guvnor was the Carmyle of Carmyle, Brent +& Co.--coal mines up in Wales, and all that sort of thing--and I suppose +he must have left Bruce something like half a million. No need for the +fellow to have worked at all, if he hadn't wanted to. As far as having +the stuff goes, he's in a position to back all the shows he wants to. +But the point is, it's right out of his line. He doesn't do that sort +of thing. Not a drop of sporting blood in the chap. Why I've known him +stick the whole family on to me just because it got noised about that +I'd dropped a couple of quid on the Grand National. If he's really +brought himself to the point of shelling out on a risky proposition like +a show, it means something, take my word for it. And I don't see what +else it can mean except... well, I mean to say, is it likely that he's +doing it simply to make your brother look on him as a good egg and a +pal, and all that sort of thing?" + +"No, it's not," agreed Sally. "But don't let's talk about it any more. +Tell me all about your trip to Chicago." + +"All right. But, returning to this binge for a moment, I don't see +how it matters to you one way or the other. You're engaged to another +fellow, and when Bruce rolls up and says: 'What about it?' you've simply +to tell him that the shot isn't on the board and will he kindly melt +away. Then you hand him his hat and out he goes." + +Sally gave a troubled laugh. + +"You think that's simple, do you? I suppose you imagine that a girl +enjoys that sort of thing? Oh, what's the use of talking about it? It's +horrible, and no amount of arguing will make it anything else. Do let's +change the subject. How did you like Chicago?" + +"Oh, all right. Rather a grubby sort of place." + +"So I've always heard. But you ought not to mind that, being a +Londoner." + +"Oh, I didn't mind it. As a matter of fact, I had rather a good time. +Saw one or two shows, you know. Got in on my face as your brother's +representative, which was all to the good. By the way, it's rummy how +you run into people when you move about, isn't it?" + +"You talk as if you had been dashing about the streets with your eyes +shut. Did you meet somebody you knew?" + +"Chap I hadn't seen for years. Was at school with him, as a matter of +fact. Fellow named Foster. But I expect you know him, too, don't you? By +name, at any rate. He wrote your brother's show." + +Sally's heart jumped. + +"Oh! Did you meet Gerald--Foster?" + +"Ran into him one night at the theatre." + +"And you were really at school with him?" + +"Yes. He was in the footer team with me my last year." + +"Was he a scrum-half, too?" asked Sally, dimpling. + +Ginger looked shocked. + +"You don't have two scrum-halves in a team," he said, pained at this +ignorance on a vital matter. "The scrum-half is the half who works the +scrum and..." + +"Yes, you told me that at Roville. What was Gerald--Mr. Foster then? A +six and seven-eighths, or something?" + +"He was a wing-three," said Ginger with a gravity befitting his theme. +"Rather fast, with a fairly decent swerve. But he would not learn to +give the reverse pass inside to the centre." + +"Ghastly!" said Sally. + +"If," said Ginger earnestly, "a wing's bottled up by his wing and the +back, the only thing he can do, if he doesn't want to be bundled into +touch, is to give the reverse pass." + +"I know," said Sally. "If I've thought that once, I've thought it a +hundred times. How nice it must have been for you meeting again. I +suppose you had all sorts of things to talk about?" + +Ginger shook his head. + +"Not such a frightful lot. We were never very thick. You see, this chap +Foster was by way of being a bit of a worm." + +"What!" + +"A tick," explained Ginger. "A rotter. He was pretty generally barred at +school. Personally, I never had any use for him at all." + +Sally stiffened. She had liked Ginger up to that moment, and later on, +no doubt, she would resume her liking for him: but in the immediate +moment which followed these words she found herself regarding him with +stormy hostility. How dare he sit there saying things like that about +Gerald? + +Ginger, who was lighting a cigarette without a care in the world, +proceeded to develop his theme. + +"It's a rummy thing about school. Generally, if a fellow's good at +games--in the cricket team or the footer team and so forth--he +can hardly help being fairly popular. But this blighter Foster +somehow--nobody seemed very keen on him. Of course, he had a few of his +own pals, but most of the chaps rather gave him a miss. It may have been +because he was a bit sidey... had rather an edge on him, you know... +Personally, the reason I barred him was because he wasn't straight. +You didn't notice it if you weren't thrown a goodish bit with him, of +course, but he and I were in the same house, and..." + +Sally managed to control her voice, though it shook a little. + +"I ought to tell you," she said, and her tone would have warned him had +he been less occupied, "that Mr. Foster is a great friend of mine." + +But Ginger was intent on the lighting of his cigarette, a delicate +operation with the breeze blowing in through the open window. His head +was bent, and he had formed his hands into a protective framework which +half hid his face. + +"If you take my tip," he mumbled, "you'll drop him. He's a wrong 'un." + +He spoke with the absent-minded drawl of preoccupation, and Sally could +keep the conflagration under no longer. She was aflame from head to +foot. + +"It may interest you to know," she said, shooting the words out like +bullets from between clenched teeth, "that Gerald Foster is the man I am +engaged to marry." + +Ginger's head came slowly up from his cupped hands. Amazement was in his +eyes, and a sort of horror. The cigarette hung limply from his mouth. He +did not speak, but sat looking at her, dazed. Then the match burnt his +fingers, and he dropped it with a start. The sharp sting of it seemed to +wake him. He blinked. + +"You're joking," he said, feebly. There was a note of wistfulness in his +voice. "It isn't true?" + +Sally kicked the leg of her chair irritably. She read insolent +disapproval into the words. He was daring to criticize... + +"Of course it's true..." + +"But..." A look of hopeless misery came into Ginger's pleasant face. He +hesitated. Then, with the air of a man bracing himself to a dreadful, +but unavoidable, ordeal, he went on. He spoke gruffly, and his eyes, +which had been fixed on Sally's, wandered down to the match on the +carpet. It was still glowing, and mechanically he put a foot on it. + +"Foster's married," he said shortly. "He was married the day before I +left Chicago." + + + +3 + + + +It seemed to Ginger that in the silence which followed, brooding over +the room like a living presence, even the noises in the street had +ceased, as though what he had said had been a spell cutting Sally +and himself off from the outer world. Only the little clock on the +mantelpiece ticked--ticked--ticked, like a heart beating fast. + +He stared straight before him, conscious of a strange rigidity. He felt +incapable of movement, as he had sometimes felt in nightmares; and not +for all the wealth of America could he have raised his eyes just then to +Sally's face. He could see her hands. They had tightened on the arm of +the chair. The knuckles were white. + +He was blaming himself bitterly now for his oafish clumsiness in +blurting out the news so abruptly. And yet, curiously, in his remorse +there was something of elation. Never before had he felt so near to her. +It was as though a barrier that had been between them had fallen. + +Something moved... It was Sally's hand, slowly relaxing. The fingers +loosened their grip, tightened again, then, as if reluctantly relaxed +once more. The blood flowed back. + +"Your cigarette's out." + +Ginger started violently. Her voice, coming suddenly out of the silence, +had struck him like a blow. + +"Oh, thanks!" + +He forced himself to light another match. It sputtered noisily in the +stillness. He blew it out, and the uncanny quiet fell again. + +Ginger drew at his cigarette mechanically. For an instant he had seen +Sally's face, white-cheeked and bright-eyed, the chin tilted like a flag +flying over a stricken field. His mood changed. All his emotions had +crystallized into a dull, futile rage, a helpless fury directed at a man +a thousand miles away. + +Sally spoke again. Her voice sounded small and far off, an odd flatness +in it. + +"Married?" + +Ginger threw his cigarette out of the window. He was shocked to find +that he was smoking. Nothing could have been farther from his intention +than to smoke. He nodded. + +"Whom has he married?" + +Ginger coughed. Something was sticking in his throat, and speech was +difficult. + +"A girl called Doland." + +"Oh, Elsa Doland?" + +"Yes." + +"Elsa Doland." Sally drummed with her fingers on the arm of the chair. +"Oh, Elsa Doland?" + +There was silence again. The little clock ticked fussily on the +mantelpiece. Out in the street automobile horns were blowing. From +somewhere in the distance came faintly the rumble of an elevated train. +Familiar sounds, but they came to Sally now with a curious, unreal sense +of novelty. She felt as though she had been projected into another world +where everything was new and strange and horrible--everything except +Ginger. About him, in the mere sight of him, there was something known +and heartening. + +Suddenly, she became aware that she was feeling that Ginger was behaving +extremely well. She seemed to have been taken out of herself and to be +regarding the scene from outside, regarding it coolly and critically; +and it was plain to her that Ginger, in this upheaval of all things, was +bearing himself perfectly. He had attempted no banal words of sympathy. +He had said nothing and he was not looking at her. And Sally felt that +sympathy just now would be torture, and that she could not have borne to +be looked at. + +Ginger was wonderful. In that curious, detached spirit that had come +upon her, she examined him impartially, and gratitude welled up from the +very depths of her. There he sat, saying nothing and doing nothing, as +if he knew that all she needed, the only thing that could keep her sane +in this world of nightmare, was the sight of that dear, flaming head +of his that made her feel that the world had not slipped away from her +altogether. + +Ginger did not move. The room had grown almost dark now. A spear of +light from a street lamp shone in through the window. + +Sally got up abruptly. Slowly, gradually, inch by inch, the great +suffocating cloud which had been crushing her had lifted. She felt alive +again. Her black hour had gone, and she was back in the world of +living things once more. She was afire with a fierce, tearing pain that +tormented her almost beyond endurance, but dimly she sensed the fact +that she had passed through something that was worse than pain, and, +with Ginger's stolid presence to aid her, had passed triumphantly. + +"Go and have dinner, Ginger," she said. "You must be starving." + +Ginger came to life like a courtier in the palace of the Sleeping +Beauty. He shook himself, and rose stiffly from his chair. + +"Oh, no," he said. "Not a bit, really." + +Sally switched on the light and set him blinking. She could bear to be +looked at now. + +"Go and dine," she said. "Dine lavishly and luxuriously. You've +certainly earned..." Her voice faltered for a moment. She held out her +hand. "Ginger," she said shakily, "I... Ginger, you're a pal." + +When he had gone. Sally sat down and began to cry. Then she dried her +eyes in a business-like manner. + +"There, Miss Nicholas!" she said. "You couldn't have done that an hour +ago... We will now boil you an egg for your dinner and see how that +suits you!" + + + + +CHAPTER XI. SALLY RUNS AWAY + + + +If Ginger Kemp had been asked to enumerate his good qualities, it is not +probable that he would have drawn up a very lengthy list. He might have +started by claiming for himself the virtue of meaning well, but after +that he would have had to chew the pencil in prolonged meditation. And, +even if he could eventually have added one or two further items to the +catalogue, tact and delicacy of feeling would not have been among them. + +Yet, by staying away from Sally during the next few days he showed +considerable delicacy. It was not easy to stay away from her, but he +forced himself to do so. He argued from his own tastes, and was strongly +of opinion that in times of travail, solitude was what the sufferer most +desired. In his time he, too, had had what he would have described as +nasty jars, and on these occasions all he had asked was to be allowed to +sit and think things over and fight his battle out by himself. + +By Saturday, however, he had come to the conclusion that some form of +action might now be taken. Saturday was rather a good day for picking up +the threads again. He had not to go to the office, and, what was still +more to the point, he had just drawn his week's salary. Mrs. Meecher had +deftly taken a certain amount of this off him, but enough remained to +enable him to attempt consolation on a fairly princely scale. There +presented itself to him as a judicious move the idea of hiring a car and +taking Sally out to dinner at one of the road-houses he had heard about +up the Boston Post Road. He examined the scheme. The more he looked at +it, the better it seemed. + +He was helped to this decision by the extraordinary perfection of the +weather. The weather of late had been a revelation to Ginger. It was his +first experience of America's Indian Summer, and it had quite overcome +him. As he stood on the roof of Mrs. Meecher's establishment on the +Saturday morning, thrilled by the velvet wonder of the sunshine, it +seemed to him that the only possible way of passing such a day was to +take Sally for a ride in an open car. + +The Maison Meecher was a lofty building on one of the side-streets at +the lower end of the avenue. From its roof, after you had worked +your way through the groves of washing which hung limply from the +clothes-line, you could see many things of interest. To the left +lay Washington Square, full of somnolent Italians and roller-skating +children; to the right was a spectacle which never failed to intrigue +Ginger, the high smoke-stacks of a Cunard liner moving slowly down the +river, sticking up over the house-tops as if the boat was travelling +down Ninth Avenue. + +To-day there were four of these funnels, causing Ginger to deduce the +Mauritania. As the boat on which he had come over from England, the +Mauritania had a sentimental interest for him. He stood watching her +stately progress till the higher buildings farther down the town shut +her from his sight; then picked his way through the washing and went +down to his room to get his hat. A quarter of an hour later he was +in the hall-way of Sally's apartment house, gazing with ill-concealed +disgust at the serge-clad back of his cousin Mr. Carmyle, who was +engaged in conversation with a gentleman in overalls. + +No care-free prospector, singing his way through the Mojave Desert +and suddenly finding himself confronted by a rattlesnake, could have +experienced so abrupt a change of mood as did Ginger at this revolting +spectacle. Even in their native Piccadilly it had been unpleasant to run +into Mr. Carmyle. To find him here now was nothing short of nauseating. +Only one thing could have brought him to this place. Obviously, he must +have come to see Sally; and with a sudden sinking of the heart Ginger +remembered the shiny, expensive automobile which he had seen waiting at +the door. He, it was clear, was not the only person to whom the idea had +occurred of taking Sally for a drive on this golden day. + +He was still standing there when Mr. Carmyle swung round with a frown +on his dark face which seemed to say that he had not found the janitor's +conversation entertaining. The sight of Ginger plainly did nothing to +lighten his gloom. + +"Hullo!" he said. + +"Hullo!" said Ginger. + +Uncomfortable silence followed these civilities. + +"Have you come to see Miss Nicholas?" + +"Why, yes." + +"She isn't here," said Mr. Carmyle, and the fact that he had found +someone to share the bad news, seemed to cheer him a little. + +"Not here?" + +"No. Apparently..." Bruce Carmyle's scowl betrayed that resentment which +a well-balanced man cannot but feel at the unreasonableness of others. +"... Apparently, for some extraordinary reason, she has taken it into +her head to dash over to England." + +Ginger tottered. The unexpectedness of the blow was crushing. He +followed his cousin out into the sunshine in a sort of dream. Bruce +Carmyle was addressing the driver of the expensive automobile. + +"I find I shall not want the car. You can take it back to the garage." + +The chauffeur, a moody man, opened one half-closed eye and spat +cautiously. It was the way Rockefeller would have spat when approaching +the crisis of some delicate financial negotiation. + +"You'll have to pay just the same," he observed, opening his other eye +to lend emphasis to the words. + +"Of course I shall pay," snapped Mr. Carmyle, irritably. "How much is +it?" + +Money passed. The car rolled off. + +"Gone to England?" said Ginger, dizzily. + +"Yes, gone to England." + +"But why?" + +"How the devil do I know why?" Bruce Carmyle would have found his best +friend trying at this moment. Gaping Ginger gave him almost a physical +pain. "All I know is what the janitor told me, that she sailed on the +Mauretania this morning." + +The tragic irony of this overcame Ginger. That he should have stood on +the roof, calmly watching the boat down the river... + +He nodded absently to Mr. Carmyle and walked off. He had no further +remarks to make. The warmth had gone out of the sunshine and all +interest had departed from his life. He felt dull, listless, at a loose +end. Not even the thought that his cousin, a careful man with his money, +had had to pay a day's hire for a car which he could not use brought him +any balm. He loafed aimlessly about the streets. He wandered in the Park +and out again. The Park bored him. The streets bored him. The whole +city bored him. A city without Sally in it was a drab, futile city, and +nothing that the sun could do to brighten it could make it otherwise. + +Night came at last, and with it a letter. It was the first even passably +pleasant thing that had happened to Ginger in the whole of this dreary +and unprofitable day: for the envelope bore the crest of the good ship +Mauretania. He snatched it covetously from the letter-rack, and carried +it upstairs to his room. + +Very few of the rooms at Mrs. Meecher's boarding-house struck any +note of luxury. Mrs. Meecher was not one of your fashionable interior +decorators. She considered that when she had added a Morris chair to the +essentials which make up a bedroom, she had gone as far in the direction +of pomp as any guest at seven-and-a-half per could expect her to go. As +a rule, the severity of his surroundings afflicted Ginger with a touch +of gloom when he went to bed; but to-night--such is the magic of a +letter from the right person--he was uplifted and almost gay. There are +moments when even illuminated texts over the wash-stand cannot wholly +quell us. + +There was nothing of haste and much of ceremony in Ginger's method of +approaching the perusal of his correspondence. He bore himself after the +manner of a small boy in the presence of unexpected ice-cream, gloating +for awhile before embarking on the treat, anxious to make it last out. +His first move was to feel in the breast-pocket of his coat and produce +the photograph of Sally which he had feloniously removed from her +apartment. At this he looked long and earnestly before propping it +up within easy reach against his basin, to be handy, if required, for +purposes of reference. He then took off his coat, collar, and shoes, +filled and lit a pipe, placed pouch and matches on the arm of the Morris +chair, and drew that chair up so that he could sit with his feet on the +bed. Having manoeuvred himself into a position of ease, he lit his pipe +again and took up the letter. He looked at the crest, the handwriting of +the address, and the postmark. He weighed it in his hand. It was a bulky +letter. + +He took Sally's photograph from the wash-stand and scrutinized it once +more. Then he lit his pipe again, and, finally, wriggling himself into +the depths of the chair, opened the envelope. + +"Ginger, dear." + +Having read so far, Ginger found it necessary to take up the photograph +and study it with an even greater intentness than before. He gazed at it +for many minutes, then laid it down and lit his pipe again. Then he went +on with the letter. + +"Ginger, dear--I'm afraid this address is going to give you rather a +shock, and I'm feeling very guilty. I'm running away, and I haven't even +stopped to say good-bye. I can't help it. I know it's weak and cowardly, +but I simply can't help it. I stood it for a day or two, and then I +saw that it was no good. (Thank you for leaving me alone and not coming +round to see me. Nobody else but you would have done that. But then, +nobody ever has been or ever could be so understanding as you.)" + +Ginger found himself compelled at this point to look at the photograph +again. + +"There was too much in New York to remind me. That's the worst of being +happy in a place. When things go wrong you find there are too many +ghosts about. I just couldn't stand it. I tried, but I couldn't. I'm +going away to get cured--if I can. Mr. Faucitt is over in England, and +when I went down to Mrs. Meecher for my letters, I found one from him. +His brother is dead, you know, and he has inherited, of all things, +a fashionable dress-making place in Regent Street. His brother was +Laurette et Cie. I suppose he will sell the business later on, but, just +at present, the poor old dear is apparently quite bewildered and that +doesn't seem to have occurred to him. He kept saying in his letter how +much he wished I was with him, to help him, and I was tempted and ran. +Anything to get away from the ghosts and have something to do. I don't +suppose I shall feel much better in England, but, at least, every street +corner won't have associations. Don't ever be happy anywhere, Ginger. +It's too big a risk, much too big a risk. + +"There was a letter from Elsa Doland, too. Bubbling over with affection. +We had always been tremendous friends. Of course, she never knew +anything about my being engaged to Gerald. I lent Fillmore the money to +buy that piece, which gave Elsa her first big chance, and so she's very +grateful. She says, if ever she gets the opportunity of doing me a good +turn... Aren't things muddled? + +"And there was a letter from Gerald. I was expecting one, of course, +but... what would you have done, Ginger? Would you have read it? I sat +with it in front of me for an hour, I should think, just looking at the +envelope, and then... You see, what was the use? I could guess exactly +the sort of thing that would be in it, and reading it would only have +hurt a lot more. The thing was done, so why bother about explanations? +What good are explanations, anyway? They don't help. They don't do +anything... I burned it, Ginger. The last letter I shall ever get from +him. I made a bonfire on the bathroom floor, and it smouldered and went +brown, and then flared a little, and every now and then I lit another +match and kept it burning, and at last it was just black ashes and a +stain on the tiles. Just a mess! + +"Ginger, burn this letter, too. I'm pouring out all the poison to you, +hoping it will make me feel better. You don't mind, do you? But I know +you don't. If ever anybody had a real pal... + +"It's a dreadful thing, fascination, Ginger. It grips you and you are +helpless. One can be so sensible and reasonable about other people's +love affairs. When I was working at the dance place I told you about +there was a girl who fell in love with the most awful little beast. He +had a mean mouth and shiny black hair brushed straight back, and anybody +would have seen what he was. But this girl wouldn't listen to a word. +I talked to her by the hour. It makes me smile now when I think how +sensible and level-headed I was. But she wouldn't listen. In some +mysterious way this was the man she wanted, and, of course, everything +happened that one knew would happen. + +"If one could manage one's own life as well as one can manage other +people's! If all this wretched thing of mine had happened to some other +girl, how beautifully I could have proved that it was the best thing +that could have happened, and that a man who could behave as Gerald has +done wasn't worth worrying about. I can just hear myself. But, you see, +whatever he has done, Gerald is still Gerald and Sally is still Sally +and, however much I argue, I can't get away from that. All I can do is +to come howling to my redheaded pal, when I know just as well as he does +that a girl of any spirit would be dignified and keep her troubles to +herself and be much too proud to let anyone know that she was hurt. + +"Proud! That's the real trouble, Ginger. My pride has been battered and +chopped up and broken into as many pieces as you broke Mr. Scrymgeour's +stick! What pitiful creatures we are. Girls, I mean. At least, I suppose +a good many girls are like me. If Gerald had died and I had lost him +that way, I know quite well I shouldn't be feeling as I do now. I should +have been broken-hearted, but it wouldn't have been the same. It's +my pride that is hurt. I have always been a bossy, cocksure little +creature, swaggering about the world like an English sparrow; and now +I'm paying for it! Oh, Ginger, I'm paying for it! I wonder if running +away is going to do me any good at all. Perhaps, if Mr. Faucitt has some +real hard work for me to do... + +"Of course, I know exactly how all this has come about. Elsa's pretty +and attractive. But the point is that she is a success, and as a success +she appeals to Gerald's weakest side. He worships success. She is going +to have a marvellous career, and she can help Gerald on in his. He can +write plays for her to star in. What have I to offer against that? Yes, +I know it's grovelling and contemptible of me to say that, Ginger. I +ought to be above it, oughtn't I--talking as if I were competing for +some prize... But I haven't any pride left. Oh, well! + +"There! I've poured it all out and I really do feel a little better +just for the moment. It won't last, of course, but even a minute is +something. Ginger, dear, I shan't see you for ever so long, even if we +ever do meet again, but you'll try to remember that I'm thinking of +you a whole lot, won't you? I feel responsible for you. You're my baby. +You've got started now and you've only to stick to it. Please, please, +please don't 'make a hash of it'! Good-bye. I never did find that +photograph of me that we were looking for that afternoon in the +apartment, or I would send it to you. Then you could have kept it on +your mantelpiece, and whenever you felt inclined to make a hash of +anything I would have caught your eye sternly and you would have pulled +up. + +"Good-bye, Ginger. I shall have to stop now. The mail is just closing. + +"Always your pal, wherever I am.---SALLY." + +Ginger laid the letter down, and a little sound escaped him that was +half a sigh, half an oath. He was wondering whether even now some +desirable end might not be achieved by going to Chicago and breaking +Gerald Foster's neck. Abandoning this scheme as impracticable, and +not being able to think of anything else to do he re-lit his pipe and +started to read the letter again. + + + + +CHAPTER XII. SOME LETTERS FOR GINGER + + + +Laurette et Cie, + +Regent Street, + +London, W., + +England. + + + +January 21st. + +Dear Ginger,--I'm feeling better. As it's three months since I last +wrote to you, no doubt you will say to yourself that I would be a poor, +weak-minded creature if I wasn't. I suppose one ought to be able to get +over anything in three months. Unfortunately, I'm afraid I haven't quite +succeeded in doing that, but at least I have managed to get my troubles +stowed away in the cellar, and I'm not dragging them out and looking at +them all the time. That's something, isn't it? + +I ought to give you all my impressions of London, I suppose; but I've +grown so used to the place that I don't think I have any now. I seem to +have been here years and years. + +You will see by the address that Mr. Faucitt has not yet sold his +inheritance. He expects to do so very soon, he tells me--there is a +rich-looking man with whiskers and a keen eye whom he is always lunching +with, and I think big deals are in progress. Poor dear! he is crazy to +get away into the country and settle down and grow ducks and things. +London has disappointed him. It is not the place it used to be. Until +quite lately, when he grew resigned, he used to wander about in a +disconsolate sort of way, trying to locate the landmarks of his youth. +(He has not been in England for nearly thirty years!) The trouble is, it +seems, that about once in every thirty years a sort of craze for change +comes over London, and they paint a shop-front red instead of blue, and +that upsets the returned exile dreadfully. Mr. Faucitt feels like Rip +Van Winkle. His first shock was when he found that the Empire was a +theatre now instead of a music-hall. Then he was told that another +music-hall, the Tivoli, had been pulled down altogether. And when on top +of that he went to look at the baker's shop in Rupert Street, over which +he had lodgings in the eighties, and discovered that it had been turned +into a dressmaker's, he grew very melancholy, and only cheered up a +little when a lovely magenta fog came on and showed him that some things +were still going along as in the good old days. + +I am kept quite busy at Laurette et Cie., thank goodness. (Not being a +French scholar like you--do you remember Jules?--I thought at first that +Cie was the name of the junior partner, and looked forward to meeting +him. "Miss Nicholas, shake hands with Mr. Cie, one of your greatest +admirers.") I hold down the female equivalent of your job at the +Fillmore Nicholas Theatrical Enterprises Ltd.--that is to say, I'm a +sort of right-hand woman. I hang around and sidle up to the customers +when they come in, and say, "Chawming weather, moddom!" (which is +usually a black lie) and pass them on to the staff, who do the actual +work. I shouldn't mind going on like this for the next few years, but +Mr. Faucitt is determined to sell. I don't know if you are like that, +but every other Englishman I've ever met seems to have an ambition to +own a house and lot in Loamshire or Hants or Salop or somewhere. +Their one object in life is to make some money and "buy back the old +place"--which was sold, of course, at the end of act one to pay the +heir's gambling debts. + +Mr. Faucitt, when he was a small boy, used to live in a little village +in Gloucestershire, near a place called Cirencester--at least, it isn't: +it's called Cissister, which I bet you didn't know--and after forgetting +about it for fifty years, he has suddenly been bitten by the desire to +end his days there, surrounded by pigs and chickens. He took me down to +see the place the other day. Oh, Ginger, this English country! Why any +of you ever live in towns I can't think. Old, old grey stone houses with +yellow haystacks and lovely squelchy muddy lanes and great fat trees and +blue hills in the distance. The peace of it! If ever I sell my soul, I +shall insist on the devil giving me at least forty years in some English +country place in exchange. + +Perhaps you will think from all this that I am too much occupied to +remember your existence. Just to show how interested I am in you, let +me tell you that, when I was reading the paper a week ago, I happened to +see the headline, "International Match." It didn't seem to mean anything +at first, and then I suddenly recollected. This was the thing you had +once been a snip for! So I went down to a place called Twickenham, where +this football game was to be, to see the sort of thing you used to do +before I took charge of you and made you a respectable right-hand man. +There was an enormous crowd there, and I was nearly squeezed to death, +but I bore it for your sake. I found out that the English team were the +ones wearing white shirts, and that the ones in red were the Welsh. I +said to the man next to me, after he had finished yelling himself +black in the face, "Could you kindly inform me which is the English +scrum-half?" And just at that moment the players came quite near where +I was, and about a dozen assassins in red hurled themselves violently +on top of a meek-looking little fellow who had just fallen on the ball. +Ginger, you are well out of it! That was the scrum-half, and I gathered +that that sort of thing was a mere commonplace in his existence. +Stopping a rush, it is called, and he is expected to do it all the time. +The idea of you ever going in for such brutal sports! You thank your +stars that you are safe on your little stool in Fillmore's outer office, +and that, if anybody jumps on top of you now, you can call a cop. Do you +mean to say you really used to do these daredevil feats? You must have +hidden depths in you which I have never suspected. + +As I was taking a ride down Piccadilly the other day on top of a bus, I +saw somebody walking along who seemed familiar. It was Mr. Carmyle. So +he's back in England again. He didn't see me, thank goodness. I don't +want to meet anybody just at present who reminds me of New York. + +Thanks for telling me all the news, but please don't do it again. It +makes me remember, and I don't want to. It's this way, Ginger. Let me +write to you, because it really does relieve me, but don't answer my +letters. Do you mind? I'm sure you'll understand. + +So Fillmore and Gladys Winch are married! From what I have seen of +her, it's the best thing that has ever happened to Brother F. She is a +splendid girl. I must write to him... + + + +Laurette et Cie.. + +London + + + +March 12th. + +Dear Ginger,--I saw in a Sunday paper last week that "The Primrose Way" +had been produced in New York, and was a great success. Well, I'm very +glad. But I don't think the papers ought to print things like that. It's +unsettling. + +Next day, I did one of those funny things you do when you're feeling +blue and lonely and a long way away from everybody. I called at your +club and asked for you! Such a nice old man in uniform at the desk said +in a fatherly way that you hadn't been in lately, and he rather fancied +you were out of town, but would I take a seat while he inquired. He +then summoned a tiny boy, also in uniform, and the child skipped off +chanting, "Mister Kemp! Mister Kemp!" in a shrill treble. It gave me +such an odd feeling to hear your name echoing in the distance. I felt so +ashamed for giving them all that trouble; and when the boy came back +I slipped twopence into his palm, which I suppose was against all the +rules, though he seemed to like it. + +Mr. Faucitt has sold the business and retired to the country, and I am +rather at a loose end... + + + + Monk's Crofton, + (whatever that means) + Much Middleford, + Salop, + (slang for Shropshire) + England. + + + +April 18th. + +Dear Ginger,--What's the use? What is the use? I do all I can to get +right away from New York, and New York comes after me and tracks me down +in my hiding-place. A week or so ago, as I was walking down the Strand +in an aimless sort of way, out there came right on top of me--who do you +think? Fillmore, arm in arm with Mr. Carmyle! I couldn't dodge. In the +first place, Mr. Carmyle had seen me; in the second place, it is a day's +journey to dodge poor dear Fillmore now. I blushed for him. Ginger! +Right there in the Strand I blushed for him. In my worst dreams I had +never pictured him so enormous. Upon what meat doth this our Fillmore +feed that he is grown so great? Poor Gladys! When she looks at him she +must feel like a bigamist. + +Apparently Fillmore is still full of big schemes, for he talked airily +about buying all sorts of English plays. He has come over, as I suppose +you know, to arrange about putting on "The Primrose Way" over here. He +is staying at the Savoy, and they took me off there to lunch, whooping +joyfully as over a strayed lamb. It was the worst thing that could +possibly have happened to me. Fillmore talked Broadway without a pause, +till by the time he had worked his way past the French pastry and was +lolling back, breathing a little stertorously, waiting for the coffee +and liqueurs, he had got me so homesick that, if it hadn't been that I +didn't want to make a public exhibition of myself, I should have broken +down and howled. It was crazy of me ever to go near the Savoy. Of +course, it's simply an annex to Broadway. There were Americans at every +table as far as the eye could reach. I might just as well have been at +the Astor. + +Well, if Fate insists in bringing New York to England for my special +discomfiture, I suppose I have got to put up with it. I just let events +take their course, and I have been drifting ever since. Two days ago +I drifted here. Mr. Carmyle invited Fillmore--he seems to love +Fillmore--and me to Monk's Crofton, and I hadn't even the shadow of an +excuse for refusing. So I came, and I am now sitting writing to you in +an enormous bedroom with an open fire and armchairs and every other sort +of luxury. Fillmore is out golfing. He sails for New York on Saturday on +the Mauretania. I am horrified to hear from him that, in addition to all +his other big schemes, he is now promoting a fight for the light-weight +championship in Jersey City, and guaranteeing enormous sums to both +boxers. It's no good arguing with him. If you do, he simply quotes +figures to show the fortunes other people have made out of these things. +Besides, it's too late now, anyway. As far as I can make out, the fight +is going to take place in another week or two. All the same, it makes my +flesh creep. + +Well, it's no use worrying, I suppose. Let's change the subject. Do you +know Monk's Crofton? Probably you don't, as I seem to remember hearing +something said about it being a recent purchase. Mr. Carmyle bought it +from some lord or other who had been losing money on the Stock Exchange. +I hope you haven't seen it, anyway, because I want to describe it at +great length. I want to pour out my soul about it. Ginger, what has +England ever done to deserve such paradises? I thought, in my ignorance, +that Mr. Faucitt's Cissister place was pretty good, but it doesn't even +begin. It can't compete. Of course, his is just an ordinary country +house, and this is a Seat. Monk's Crofton is the sort of place they used +to write about in the English novels. You know. "The sunset was falling +on the walls of G---- Castle, in B----shire, hard by the picturesque +village of H----, and not a stone's throw from the hamlet of J----." I +can imagine Tennyson's Maud living here. It is one of the stately homes +of England; how beautiful they stand, and I'm crazy about it. + +You motor up from the station, and after you have gone about three +miles, you turn in at a big iron gate with stone posts on each side with +stone beasts on them. Close by the gate is the cutest little house with +an old man inside it who pops out and touches his hat. This is only the +lodge, really, but you think you have arrived; so you get all ready to +jump out, and then the car goes rolling on for another fifty miles or so +through beech woods full of rabbits and open meadows with deer in them. +Finally, just as you think you are going on for ever, you whizz round a +corner, and there's the house. You don't get a glimpse of it till then, +because the trees are too thick. + +It's very large, and sort of low and square, with a kind of tower at +one side and the most fascinating upper porch sort of thing with +battlements. I suppose in the old days you used to stand on this and +drop molten lead on visitors' heads. Wonderful lawns all round, and +shrubberies and a lake that you can just see where the ground dips +beyond the fields. Of course it's too early yet for them to be out, but +to the left of the house there's a place where there will be about +a million roses when June comes round, and all along the side of the +rose-garden is a high wall of old red brick which shuts off the kitchen +garden. I went exploring there this morning. It's an enormous place, +with hot-houses and things, and there's the cunningest farm at one end +with a stable yard full of puppies that just tear the heart out of you, +they're so sweet. And a big, sleepy cat, which sits and blinks in +the sun and lets the puppies run all over her. And there's a lovely +stillness, and you can hear everything growing. And thrushes and +blackbirds... Oh, Ginger, it's heavenly! + +But there's a catch. It's a case of "Where every prospect pleases and +only man is vile." At least, not exactly vile, I suppose, but terribly +stodgy. I can see now why you couldn't hit it off with the Family. +Because I've seen 'em all! They're here! Yes, Uncle Donald and all of +them. Is it a habit of your family to collect in gangs, or have I just +happened to stumble into an accidental Old Home Week? When I came down +to dinner the first evening, the drawing-room was full to bursting +point--not simply because Fillmore was there, but because there were +uncles and aunts all over the place. I felt like a small lion in a den +of Daniels. I know exactly now what you mean about the Family. They look +at you! Of course, it's all right for me, because I am snowy white clear +through, but I can just imagine what it must have been like for you with +your permanently guilty conscience. You must have had an awful time. + +By the way, it's going to be a delicate business getting this letter +through to you--rather like carrying the despatches through the enemy's +lines in a Civil War play. You're supposed to leave letters on the table +in the hall, and someone collects them in the afternoon and takes them +down to the village on a bicycle. But, if I do that some aunt or uncle +is bound to see it, and I shall be an object of loathing, for it is no +light matter, my lad, to be caught having correspondence with a human +Jimpson weed like you. It would blast me socially. At least, so I gather +from the way they behaved when your name came up at dinner last night. +Somebody mentioned you, and the most awful roasting party broke loose. +Uncle Donald acting as cheer-leader. I said feebly that I had met you +and had found you part human, and there was an awful silence till they +all started at the same time to show me where I was wrong, and how +cruelly my girlish inexperience had deceived me. A young and innocent +half-portion like me, it appears, is absolutely incapable of suspecting +the true infamy of the dregs of society. You aren't fit to speak to the +likes of me, being at the kindest estimate little more than a blot on +the human race. I tell you this in case you may imagine you're popular +with the Family. You're not. + +So I shall have to exercise a good deal of snaky craft in smuggling this +letter through. I'll take it down to the village myself if I can sneak +away. But it's going to be pretty difficult, because for some reason I +seem to be a centre of attraction. Except when I take refuge in my +room, hardly a moment passes without an aunt or an uncle popping out +and having a cosy talk with me. It sometimes seems as though they were +weighing me in the balance. Well, let 'em weigh! + +Time to dress for dinner now. Good-bye. + +Yours in the balance, + +Sally. + +P.S.--You were perfectly right about your Uncle Donald's moustache, but +I don't agree with you that it is more his misfortune than his fault. I +think he does it on purpose. + + + + (Just for the moment) + Monk's Crofton, + Much Middleford, + Salop, + England. + + + +April 20th. + +Dear Ginger,--Leaving here to-day. In disgrace. Hard, cold looks from +the family. Strained silences. Uncle Donald far from chummy. You can +guess what has happened. I might have seen it coming. I can see now that +it was in the air all along. + +Fillmore knows nothing about it. He left just before it happened. +I shall see him very soon, for I have decided to come back and stop +running away from things any longer. It's cowardly to skulk about over +here. Besides, I'm feeling so much better that I believe I can face +the ghosts. Anyway, I'm going to try. See you almost as soon as you get +this. + +I shall mail this in London, and I suppose it will come over by the same +boat as me. It's hardly worth writing, really, of course, but I have +sneaked up to my room to wait till the motor arrives to take me to the +station, and it's something to do. I can hear muffled voices. The Family +talking me over, probably. Saying they never really liked me all along. +Oh, well! + +Yours moving in an orderly manner to the exit, + +Sally. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. STRANGE BEHAVIOUR OF A SPARRING-PARTNER + + + +1 + + + +Sally's emotions, as she sat in her apartment on the morning of her +return to New York, resembled somewhat those of a swimmer who, after +wavering on a raw morning at the brink of a chill pool, nerves himself +to the plunge. She was aching, but she knew that she had done well. If +she wanted happiness, she must fight for it, and for all these months +she had been shirking the fight. She had done with wavering on the +brink, and here she was, in mid-stream, ready for whatever might befall. +It hurt, this coming to grips. She had expected it to hurt. But it was +a pain that stimulated, not a dull melancholy that smothered. She felt +alive and defiant. + +She had finished unpacking and tidying up. The next move was certainly +to go and see Ginger. She had suddenly become aware that she wanted very +badly to see Ginger. His stolid friendliness would be a support and a +prop. She wished now that she had sent him a cable, so that he could +have met her at the dock. It had been rather terrible at the dock. +The echoing customs sheds had sapped her valour and she felt alone and +forlorn. + +She looked at her watch, and was surprised to find how early it was. She +could catch him at the office and make him take her out to lunch. She +put on her hat and went out. + +The restless hand of change, always active in New York, had not spared +the outer office of the Fillmore Nicholas Theatrical Enterprises Ltd. in +the months of her absence. She was greeted on her arrival by an entirely +new and original stripling in the place of the one with whom at her last +visit she had established such cordial relations. Like his predecessor +he was generously pimpled, but there the resemblance stopped. He was a +grim boy, and his manner was stern and suspicious. He peered narrowly at +Sally for a moment as if he had caught her in the act of purloining the +office blotting-paper, then, with no little acerbity, desired her to +state her business. + +"I want Mr. Kemp," said Sally. + +The office-boy scratched his cheek dourly with a ruler. No one would +have guessed, so austere was his aspect, that a moment before her +entrance he had been trying to balance it on his chin, juggling the +while with a pair of paper-weights. For, impervious as he seemed +to human weaknesses, it was this lad's ambition one day to go into +vaudeville. + +"What name?" he said, coldly. + +"Nicholas," said Sally. "I am Mr. Nicholas' sister." + +On a previous occasion when she had made this announcement, disastrous +results had ensued; but to-day it went well. It seemed to hit the +office-boy like a bullet. He started convulsively, opened his mouth, and +dropped the ruler. In the interval of stooping and recovering it he was +able to pull himself together. He had not been curious about Sally's +name. What he had wished was to have the name of the person for whom she +was asking repeated. He now perceived that he had had a bit of luck. +A wearying period of disappointment in the matter of keeping the +paper-weights circulating while balancing the ruler, had left him +peevish, and it had been his intention to work off his ill-humour on +the young visitor. The discovery that it was the boss's sister who was +taking up his time, suggested the advisability of a radical change of +tactics. He had stooped with a frown: he returned to the perpendicular +with a smile that was positively winning. It was like the sun suddenly +bursting through a London fog. + +"Will you take a seat, lady?" he said, with polished courtesy even +unbending so far as to reach out and dust one with the sleeve of his +coat. He added that the morning was a fine one. + +"Thank you," said Sally. "Will you tell him I'm here." + +"Mr. Nicholas is out, miss," said the office-boy, with gentlemanly +regret. "He's back in New York, but he's gone out." + +"I don't want Mr. Nicholas. I want Mr. Kemp." + +"Mr. Kemp?" + +"Yes, Mr. Kemp." + +Sorrow at his inability to oblige shone from every hill-top on the boy's +face. + +"Don't know of anyone of that name around here," he said, +apologetically. + +"But surely..." Sally broke off suddenly. A grim foreboding had come to +her. "How long have you been here?" she asked. + +"All day, ma'am," said the office-boy, with the manner of a Casablanca. + +"I mean, how long have you been employed here?" + +"Just over a month, miss." + +"Hasn't Mr. Kemp been in the office all that time?" + +"Name's new to me, lady. Does he look like anything? I meanter say, +what's he look like?" + +"He has very red hair." + +"Never seen him in here," said the office-boy. The truth shone coldly +on Sally. She blamed herself for ever having gone away, and told herself +that she might have known what would happen. Left to his own resources, +the unhappy Ginger had once more made a hash of it. And this hash must +have been a more notable and outstanding hash than any of his previous +efforts, for, surely, Fillmore would not lightly have dismissed one who +had come to him under her special protection. + +"Where is Mr. Nicholas?" she asked. It seemed to her that Fillmore was +the only possible source of information. "Did you say he was out?" + +"Really out, miss," said the office-boy, with engaging candour. "He went +off to White Plains in his automobile half-an-hour ago." + +"White Plains? What for?" + +The pimpled stripling had now given himself up wholeheartedly to +social chit-chat. Usually he liked his time to himself and resented the +intrusion of the outer world, for he who had chosen jugglery for +his walk in life must neglect no opportunity of practising: but so +favourable was the impression which Sally had made on his plastic mind +that he was delighted to converse with her as long as she wished. + +"I guess what's happened is, he's gone up to take a look at Bugs +Butler," he said. + +"Whose butler?" said Sally mystified. + +The office-boy smiled a tolerant smile. Though an admirer of the sex, he +was aware that women were seldom hep to the really important things in +life. He did not blame them. That was the way they were constructed, and +one simply had to accept it. + +"Bugs Butler is training up at White Plains, miss." + +"Who is Bugs Butler?" + +Something of his former bleakness of aspect returned to the office-boy. +Sally's question had opened up a subject on which he felt deeply. + +"Ah!" he replied, losing his air of respectful deference as he +approached the topic. "Who is he! That's what they're all saying, all +the wise guys. Who has Bugs Butler ever licked?" + +"I don't know," said Sally, for he had fixed her with a penetrating gaze +and seemed to be pausing for a reply. + +"Nor nobody else," said the stripling vehemently. "A lot of stiffs out +on the coast, that's all. Ginks nobody has ever heard of, except Cyclone +Mullins, and it took that false alarm fifteen rounds to get a referee's +decision over him. The boss would go and give him a chance against the +champ, but I could have told him that the legitimate contender was +K-leg Binns. K-leg put Cyclone Mullins out in the fifth. Well," said the +office-boy in the overwrought tone of one chafing at human folly, "if +anybody thinks Bugs Butler can last six rounds with Lew Lucas, I've two +bucks right here in my vest pocket that says it ain't so." + +Sally began to see daylight. + +"Oh, Bugs--Mr. Butler is one of the boxers in this fight that my brother +is interested in?" + +"That's right. He's going up against the lightweight champ. Lew Lucas is +the lightweight champ. He's a bird!" + +"Yes?" said Sally. This youth had a way of looking at her with his head +cocked on one side as though he expected her to say something. + +"Yes, sir!" said the stripling with emphasis. "Lew Lucas is a hot +sketch. He used to live on the next street to me," he added as clinching +evidence of his hero's prowess. "I've seen his old mother as close as +I am to you. Say, I seen her a hundred times. Is any stiff of a Bugs +Butler going to lick a fellow like that?" + +"It doesn't seem likely." + +"You spoke it!" said the lad crisply, striking unsuccessfully at a fly +which had settled on the blotting-paper. + +There was a pause. Sally started to rise. + +"And there's another thing," said the office-boy, loath to close the +subject. "Can Bugs Butler make a hundred and thirty-five ringside +without being weak?" + +"It sounds awfully difficult." + +"They say he's clever." The expert laughed satirically. "Well, +what's that going to get him? The poor fish can't punch a hole in a +nut-sundae." + +"You don't seem to like Mr. Butler." + +"Oh, I've nothing against him," said the office-boy magnanimously. "I'm +only saying he's no licence to be mixing it with Lew Lucas." + +Sally got up. Absorbing as this chat on current form was, more important +matters claimed her attention. + +"How shall I find my brother when I get to White Plains?" she asked. + +"Oh, anybody'll show you the way to the training-camp. If you hurry, +there's a train you can make now." + +"Thank you very much." + +"You're welcome." + +He opened the door for her with an old-world politeness which disuse had +rendered a little rusty: then, with an air of getting back to business +after a pleasant but frivolous interlude, he took up the paper-weights +once more and placed the ruler with nice care on his upturned chin. + + + +2 + + + +Fillmore heaved a sigh of relief and began to sidle from the room. It +was a large room, half barn, half gymnasium. Athletic appliances of +various kinds hung on the walls and in the middle there was a wide +roped-off space, around which a small crowd had distributed itself with +an air of expectancy. This is a commercial age, and the days when a +prominent pugilist's training activities used to be hidden from the +public gaze are over. To-day, if the public can lay its hands on fifty +cents, it may come and gaze its fill. This afternoon, plutocrats to the +number of about forty had assembled, though not all of these, to the +regret of Mr. Lester Burrowes, the manager of the eminent Bugs Butler, +had parted with solid coin. Many of those present were newspaper +representatives and on the free list--writers who would polish up Mr. +Butler's somewhat crude prognostications as to what he proposed to do +to Mr. Lew Lucas, and would report him as saying, "I am in really superb +condition and feel little apprehension of the issue," and artists who +would depict him in a state of semi-nudity with feet several sizes too +large for any man. + +The reason for Fillmore's relief was that Mr. Burrowes, who was a great +talker and had buttonholed him a quarter of an hour ago, had at last had +his attention distracted elsewhere, and had gone off to investigate some +matter that called for his personal handling, leaving Fillmore free to +slide away to the hotel and get a bite to eat, which he sorely needed. +The zeal which had brought him to the training-camp to inspect the final +day of Mr. Butler's preparation--for the fight was to take place on the +morrow--had been so great that he had omitted to lunch before leaving +New York. + +So Fillmore made thankfully for the door. And it was at the door that he +encountered Sally. He was looking over his shoulder at the moment, and +was not aware of her presence till she spoke. + +"Hallo, Fillmore!" + +Sally had spoken softly, but a dynamite explosion could not have +shattered her brother's composure with more completeness. In the leaping +twist which brought him facing her, he rose a clear three inches from +the floor. He had a confused sensation, as though his nervous system had +been stirred up with a pole. He struggled for breath and moistened his +lips with the tip of his tongue, staring at her continuously during the +process. + +Great men, in their moments of weakness, are to be pitied rather than +scorned. If ever a man had an excuse for leaping like a young ram, +Fillmore had it. He had left Sally not much more than a week ago in +England, in Shropshire, at Monk's Crofton. She had said nothing of any +intention on her part of leaving the country, the county, or the house. +Yet here she was, in Bugs Butler's training-camp at White Plains, in the +State of New York, speaking softly in his ear without even going +through the preliminary of tapping him on the shoulder to advertise her +presence. No wonder that Fillmore was startled. And no wonder that, as +he adjusted his faculties to the situation, there crept upon him a chill +apprehension. + +For Fillmore had not been blind to the significance of that invitation +to Monk's Crofton. Nowadays your wooer does not formally approach a +girl's nearest relative and ask permission to pay his addresses; but, +when he invites her and that nearest relative to his country home and +collects all the rest of the family to meet her, the thing may be +said to have advanced beyond the realms of mere speculation. Shrewdly +Fillmore had deduced that Bruce Carmyle was in love with Sally, and +mentally he had joined their hands and given them a brother's blessing. +And now it was only too plain that disaster must have occurred. If the +invitation could mean only one thing, so also could Sally's presence at +White Plains mean only one thing. + +"Sally!" A croaking whisper was the best he could achieve. "What... +what...?" + +"Did I startle you? I'm sorry." + +"What are you doing here? Why aren't you at Monk's Crofton?" + +Sally glanced past him at the ring and the crowd around it. + +"I decided I wanted to get back to America. Circumstances arose which +made it pleasanter to leave Monk's Crofton." + +"Do you mean to say...?" + +"Yes. Don't let's talk about it." + +"Do you mean to say," persisted Fillmore, "that Carmyle proposed to you +and you turned him down?" + +Sally flushed. + +"I don't think it's particularly nice to talk about that sort of thing, +but--yes." + +A feeling of desolation overcame Fillmore. That conviction, which +saddens us at all times, of the wilful bone-headedness of our fellows +swept coldly upon him. Everything had been so perfect, the whole +arrangement so ideal, that it had never occurred to him as a possibility +that Sally might take it into her head to spoil it by declining to play +the part allotted to her. The match was so obviously the best thing that +could happen. It was not merely the suitor's impressive wealth that made +him hold this opinion, though it would be idle to deny that the prospect +of having a brother-in-lawful claim on the Carmyle bank-balance had cast +a rosy glamour over the future as he had envisaged it. He honestly +liked and respected the man. He appreciated his quiet and aristocratic +reserve. A well-bred fellow, sensible withal, just the sort of husband +a girl like Sally needed. And now she had ruined everything. With the +capricious perversity which so characterizes her otherwise delightful +sex, she had spilled the beans. + +"But why?" + +"Oh, Fill!" Sally had expected that realization of the facts would +produce these symptoms in him, but now that they had presented +themselves she was finding them rasping to the nerves. "I should have +thought the reason was obvious." + +"You mean you don't like him?" + +"I don't know whether I do or not. I certainly don't like him enough to +marry him." + +"He's a darned good fellow." + +"Is he? You say so. I don't know." + +The imperious desire for bodily sustenance began to compete successfully +for Fillmore's notice with his spiritual anguish. + +"Let's go to the hotel and talk it over. We'll go to the hotel and I'll +give you something to eat." + +"I don't want anything to eat, thanks." + +"You don't want anything to eat?" said Fillmore incredulously. He +supposed in a vague sort of way that there were eccentric people of +this sort, but it was hard to realize that he had met one of them. "I'm +starving." + +"Well, run along then." + +"Yes, but I want to talk..." + +He was not the only person who wanted to talk. At the moment a small +man of sporting exterior hurried up. He wore what his tailor's +advertisements would have called a "nobbly" suit of checked tweed +and--in defiance of popular prejudice--a brown bowler hat. Mr. Lester +Burrowes, having dealt with the business which had interrupted their +conversation a few minutes before, was anxious to resume his remarks +on the subject of the supreme excellence in every respect of his young +charge. + +"Say, Mr. Nicholas, you ain't going'? Bugs is just getting ready to +spar." + +He glanced inquiringly at Sally. + +"My sister--Mr. Burrowes," said Fillmore faintly. "Mr. Burrowes is Bugs +Butler's manager." + +"How do you do?" said Sally. + +"Pleased to meecher," said Mr. Burrowes. "Say..." + +"I was just going to the hotel to get something to eat," said Fillmore. + +Mr. Burrowes clutched at his coat-button with a swoop, and held him with +a glittering eye. + +"Yes, but, say, before-you-go-lemme-tell-ya-somef'n. You've never seen +this boy of mine, not when he was feeling right. Believe me, he's there! +He's a wizard. He's a Hindoo! Say, he's been practising up a left shift +that..." + +Fillmore's eye met Sally's wanly, and she pitied him. Presently she +would require him to explain to her how he had dared to dismiss Ginger +from his employment--and make that explanation a good one: but in the +meantime she remembered that he was her brother and was suffering. + +"He's the cleverest lightweight," proceeded Mr. Burrowes fervently, +"since Joe Gans. I'm telling you and I know! He..." + +"Can he make a hundred and thirty-five ringside without being weak?" +asked Sally. + +The effect of this simple question on Mr. Burrowes was stupendous. He +dropped away from Fillmore's coat-button like an exhausted bivalve, +and his small mouth opened feebly. It was as if a child had suddenly +propounded to an eminent mathematician some abstruse problem in the +higher algebra. Females who took an interest in boxing had come into +Mr. Burrowes' life before---in his younger days, when he was a famous +featherweight, the first of his three wives had been accustomed to sit +at the ringside during his contests and urge him in language of the +severest technicality to knock opponents' blocks off--but somehow he had +not supposed from her appearance and manner that Sally was one of the +elect. He gaped at her, and the relieved Fillmore sidled off like a bird +hopping from the compelling gaze of a snake. He was not quite sure that +he was acting correctly in allowing his sister to roam at large among +the somewhat Bohemian surroundings of a training-camp, but the instinct +of self-preservation turned the scale. He had breakfasted early, and if +he did not eat right speedily it seemed to him that dissolution would +set in. + +"Whazzat?" said Mr. Burrowes feebly. + +"It took him fifteen rounds to get a referee's decision over Cyclone +Mullins," said Sally severely, "and K-leg Binns..." + +Mr. Burrowes rallies. + +"You ain't got it right" he protested. "Say, you mustn't believe what +you see in the papers. The referee was dead against us, and Cyclone was +down once for all of half a minute and they wouldn't count him out. Gee! +You got to kill a guy in some towns before they'll give you a decision. +At that, they couldn't do nothing so raw as make it anything but a win +for my boy, after him leading by a mile all the way. Have you ever seen +Bugs, ma'am?" + +Sally had to admit that she had not had that privilege. Mr. Burrowes +with growing excitement felt in his breast-pocket and produced a +picture-postcard, which he thrust into her hand. + +"That's Bugs," he said. "Take a slant at that and then tell me if he +don't look the goods." + +The photograph represented a young man in the irreducible minimum of +clothing who crouched painfully, as though stricken with one of the +acuter forms of gastritis. + +"I'll call him over and have him sign it for you," said Mr. Burrowes, +before Sally had had time to grasp the fact that this work of art was a +gift and no mere loan. "Here, Bugs--wantcher." + +A youth enveloped in a bath-robe, who had been talking to a group of +admirers near the ring, turned, started languidly towards them, then, +seeing Sally, quickened his pace. He was an admirer of the sex. + +Mr. Burrowes did the honours. + +"Bugs, this is Miss Nicholas, come to see you work out. I have been +telling her she's going to have a treat." And to Sally. "Shake hands +with Bugs Butler, ma'am, the coming lightweight champion of the world." + +Mr. Butler's photograph, Sally considered, had flattered him. He was, in +the flesh, a singularly repellent young man. There was a mean and cruel +curve to his lips and a cold arrogance in his eye; a something dangerous +and sinister in the atmosphere he radiated. Moreover, she did not like +the way he smirked at her. + +However, she exerted herself to be amiable. + +"I hope you are going to win, Mr. Butler," she said. + +The smile which she forced as she spoke the words removed the coming +champion's doubts, though they had never been serious. He was convinced +now that he had made a hit. He always did, he reflected, with the girls. +It was something about him. His chest swelled complacently beneath the +bath-robe. + +"You betcher," he asserted briefly. + +Mr. Burrows looked at his watch. + +"Time you were starting, Bugs." + +The coming champion removed his gaze from Sally's face, into which he +had been peering in a conquering manner, and cast a disparaging glance +at the audience. It was far from being as large as he could have +wished, and at least a third of it was composed of non-payers from the +newspapers. + +"All right," he said, bored. + +His languor left him, as his gaze fell on Sally again, and his spirits +revived somewhat. After all, small though the numbers of spectators +might be, bright eyes would watch and admire him. + +"I'll go a couple of rounds with Reddy for a starter," he said. "Seen +him anywheres? He's never around when he's wanted." + +"I'll fetch him," said Mr. Burrowes. "He's back there somewheres." + +"I'm going to show that guy up this afternoon," said Mr. Butler coldly. +"He's been getting too fresh." + +The manager bustled off, and Bugs Butler, with a final smirk, left Sally +and dived under the ropes. There was a stir of interest in the audience, +though the newspaper men, blase through familiarity, exhibited no +emotion. Presently Mr. Burrowes reappeared, shepherding a young man +whose face was hidden by the sweater which he was pulling over his head. +He was a sturdily built young man. The sweater, moving from his body, +revealed a good pair of shoulders. + +A last tug, and the sweater was off. Red hair flashed into view, tousled +and disordered: and, as she saw it, Sally uttered an involuntary gasp +of astonishment which caused many eyes to turn towards her. And the +red-headed young man, who had been stooping to pick up his gloves, +straightened himself with a jerk and stood staring at her blankly and +incredulously, his face slowly crimsoning. + + + +3 + + + +It was the energetic Mr. Burrowes who broke the spell. + +"Come on, come on," he said impatiently. "Li'l speed there, Reddy." + +Ginger Kemp started like a sleep-walker awakened; then recovering +himself, slowly began to pull on the gloves. Embarrassment was stamped +on his agreeable features. His face matched his hair. + +Sally plucked at the little manager's elbow. He turned irritably, but +beamed in a distrait sort of manner when he perceived the source of the +interruption. + +"Who--him?" he said in answer to Sally's whispered question. "He's just +one of Bugs' sparring-partners." + +"But..." + +Mr. Burrowes, fussy now that the time had come for action, interrupted +her. + +"You'll excuse me, miss, but I have to hold the watch. We mustn't waste +any time." + +Sally drew back. She felt like an infidel who intrudes upon the +celebration of strange rites. This was Man's hour, and women must keep +in the background. She had the sensation of being very small and yet +very much in the way, like a puppy who has wandered into a church. The +novelty and solemnity of the scene awed her. + +She looked at Ginger, who with averted gaze was fiddling with his +clothes in the opposite corner of the ring. He was as removed from +communication as if he had been in another world. She continued to +stare, wide-eyed, and Ginger, shuffling his feet self-consciously, +plucked at his gloves. + +Mr. Butler, meanwhile, having doffed his bath-robe, stretched himself, +and with leisurely nonchalance put on a second pair of gloves, was +filling in the time with a little shadow boxing. He moved rhythmically +to and fro, now ducking his head, now striking out with his muffled +hands, and a sickening realization of the man's animal power swept over +Sally and turned her cold. Swathed in his bath-robe, Bugs Butler had +conveyed an atmosphere of dangerousness: in the boxing-tights which +showed up every rippling muscle, he was horrible and sinister, a machine +built for destruction, a human panther. + +So he appeared to Sally, but a stout and bulbous eyed man standing at +her side was not equally impressed. Obviously one of the Wise Guys +of whom her friend the sporting office-boy had spoken, he was frankly +dissatisfied with the exhibition. + +"Shadow-boxing," he observed in a cavilling spirit to his companion. +"Yes, he can do that all right, just like I can fox-trot if I ain't got +a partner to get in the way. But one good wallop, and then watch him." + +His friend, also plainly a guy of established wisdom, assented with a +curt nod. + +"Ah!" he agreed. + +"Lew Lucas," said the first wise guy, "is just as shifty, and he can +punch." + +"Ah!" said the second wise guy. + +"Just because he beats up a few poor mutts of sparring-partners," said +the first wise guy disparagingly, "he thinks he's someone." + +"Ah!" said the second wise guy. + +As far as Sally could interpret these remarks, the full meaning of which +was shrouded from her, they seemed to be reassuring. For a comforting +moment she ceased to regard Ginger as a martyr waiting to be devoured by +a lion. Mr. Butler, she gathered, was not so formidable as he appeared. +But her relief was not to be long-lived. + +"Of course he'll eat this red-headed gink," went on the first wise guy. +"That's the thing he does best, killing his sparring-partners. But Lew +Lucas..." + +Sally was not interested in Lew Lucas. That numbing fear had come back +to her. Even these cognoscenti, little as they esteemed Mr. Butler, had +plainly no doubts as to what he would do to Ginger. She tried to tear +herself away, but something stronger than her own will kept her there +standing where she was, holding on to the rope and staring forlornly +into the ring. + +"Ready, Bugs?" asked Mr. Burrowes. + +The coming champion nodded carelessly. + +"Go to it," said Mr. Burrowes. + +Ginger ceased to pluck at his gloves and advanced into the ring. + + + +4 + + + +Of all the learned professions, pugilism is the one in which the trained +expert is most sharply divided from the mere dabbler. In other fields +the amateur may occasionally hope to compete successfully with the man +who has made a business of what is to him but a sport, but at boxing +never: and the whole demeanour of Bugs Butler showed that he had laid +this truth to heart. It would be too little to say that his bearing +was confident: he comported himself with the care-free jauntiness of +an infant about to demolish a Noah's Ark with a tack-hammer. Cyclone +Mullinses might withstand him for fifteen rounds where they yielded to +a K-leg Binns in the fifth, but, when it came to beating up a +sparring-partner and an amateur at that, Bugs Butler knew his +potentialities. He was there forty ways and he did not attempt to +conceal it. Crouching as was his wont, he uncoiled himself like a +striking rattlesnake and flicked Ginger lightly over his guard. Then +he returned to his crouch and circled sinuously about the ring with the +amiable intention of showing the crowd, payers and deadheads alike, what +real footwork was. If there was one thing on which Bugs Butler prided +himself, it was footwork. + +The adverb "lightly" is a relative term, and the blow which had just +planted a dull patch on Ginger's cheekbone affected those present in +different degrees. Ginger himself appeared stolidly callous. Sally +shuddered to the core of her being and had to hold more tightly to the +rope to support herself. The two wise guys mocked openly. To the +wise guys, expert connoisseurs of swat, the thing had appeared richly +farcical. They seemed to consider the blow, administered to a third +party and not to themselves, hardly worth calling a blow at all. Two +more, landing as quickly and neatly as the first, left them equally +cold. + +"Call that punching?" said the first wise guy. + +"Ah!" said the second wise guy. + +But Mr. Butler, if he heard this criticism--and it is probable that he +did--for the wise ones had been restrained by no delicacy of feeling +from raising their voices, was in no way discommoded by it. Bugs Butler +knew what he was about. Bright eyes were watching him, and he meant to +give them a treat. The girls like smooth work. Any roughneck could sail +into a guy and knock the daylights out of him, but how few could be +clever and flashy and scientific? Few, few, indeed, thought Mr. Butler +as he slid in and led once more. + +Something solid smote Mr. Butler's nose, rocking him on to his heels and +inducing an unpleasant smarting sensation about his eyes. He backed +away and regarded Ginger with astonishment, almost with pain. Until this +moment he had scarcely considered him as an active participant in the +scene at all, and he felt strongly that this sort of thing was bad form. +It was not being done by sparring-partners. + +A juster man might have reflected that he himself was to blame. He had +undeniably been careless. In the very act of leading he had allowed his +eyes to flicker sideways to see how Sally was taking this exhibition of +science, and he had paid the penalty. Nevertheless, he was piqued. He +shimmered about the ring, thinking it over. And the more he thought it +over, the less did he approve of his young assistant's conduct. Hard +thoughts towards Ginger began to float in his mind. + +Ginger, too, was thinking hard thoughts. He had not had an easy time +since he had come to the training camp, but never till to-day had he +experienced any resentment towards his employer. Until this afternoon +Bugs Butler had pounded him honestly and without malice, and he had gone +through it, as the other sparring-partners did, phlegmatically, taking +it as part of the day's work. But this afternoon there had been a +difference. Those careless flicks had been an insult, a deliberate +offence. The man was trying to make a fool of him, playing to the +gallery: and the thought of who was in that gallery inflamed Ginger past +thought of consequences. No one, not even Mr. Butler, was more keenly +alive than he to the fact that in a serious conflict with a man who +to-morrow night might be light-weight champion of the world he stood no +chance whatever: but he did not intend to be made an exhibition of in +front of Sally without doing something to hold his end up. He proposed +to go down with his flag flying, and in pursuance of this object he dug +Mr. Butler heavily in the lower ribs with his right, causing that expert +to clinch and the two wise guys to utter sharp barking sounds expressive +of derision. + +"Say, what the hell d'ya think you're getting at?" demanded the +aggrieved pugilist in a heated whisper in Ginger's ear as they fell into +the embrace. "What's the idea, you jelly bean?" + +Ginger maintained a pink silence. His jaw was set, and the temper which +Nature had bestowed upon him to go with his hair had reached white +heat. He dodged a vicious right which whizzed up at his chin out of the +breaking clinch, and rushed. A left hook shook him, but was too high +to do more. There was rough work in the far corner, and suddenly with +startling abruptness Bugs Butler, bothered by the ropes at his back and +trying to side-step, ran into a swing and fell. + +"Time!" shouted the scandalized Mr. Burrowes, utterly aghast at +this frightful misadventure. In the whole course of his professional +experience he could recall no such devastating occurrence. + +The audience was no less startled. There was audible gasping. The +newspaper men looked at each other with a wild surmise and conjured up +pleasant pictures of their sporting editors receiving this sensational +item of news later on over the telephone. The two wise guys, continuing +to pursue Mr. Butler with their dislike, emitted loud and raucous +laughs, and one of them, forming his hands into a megaphone, urged the +fallen warrior to go away and get a rep. As for Sally, she was conscious +of a sudden, fierce, cave-womanly rush of happiness which swept away +completely the sickening qualms of the last few minutes. Her teeth +were clenched and her eyes blazed with joyous excitement. She looked +at Ginger yearningly, longing to forget a gentle upbringing and shout +congratulation to him. She was proud of him. And mingled with the pride +was a curious feeling that was almost fear. This was not the mild and +amiable young man whom she was wont to mother through the difficulties +of a world in which he was unfitted to struggle for himself. This was a +new Ginger, a stranger to her. + +On the rare occasions on which he had been knocked down in the past, +it had been Bugs Butler's canny practice to pause for a while and rest +before rising and continuing the argument, but now he was up almost +before he had touched the boards, and the satire of the second wise guy, +who had begun to saw the air with his hand and count loudly, lost its +point. It was only too plain that Mr. Butler's motto was that a man +may be down, but he is never out. And, indeed, the knock-down had been +largely a stumble. Bugs Butler's educated feet, which had carried him +unscathed through so many contests, had for this single occasion managed +to get themselves crossed just as Ginger's blow landed, and it was to +his lack of balance rather than the force of the swing that his downfall +had been due. + +"Time!" he snarled, casting a malevolent side-glance at his manager. +"Like hell it's time!" + +And in a whirlwind of flying gloves he flung himself upon Ginger, +driving him across the ring, while Mr. Burrowes, watch in hand, stared +with dropping jaw. If Ginger had seemed a new Ginger to Sally, still +more did this seem a new Bugs Butler to Mr. Burrowes, and the manager +groaned in spirit. Coolness, skill and science--these had been the +qualities in his protege which had always so endeared him to Mr. Lester +Burrowes and had so enriched their respective bank accounts: and now, on +the eve of the most important fight in his life, before an audience of +newspaper men, he had thrown them all aside and was making an exhibition +of himself with a common sparring-partner. + +That was the bitter blow to Mr. Burrowes. Had this lapse into the +unscientific primitive happened in a regular fight, he might have +mourned and poured reproof into Bug's ear when he got him back in his +corner at the end of the round; but he would not have experienced this +feeling of helpless horror--the sort of horror an elder of the church +might feel if he saw his favourite bishop yielding in public to the +fascination of jazz. It was the fact that Bugs Butler was lowering +himself to extend his powers against a sparring-partner that shocked Mr. +Burrowes. There is an etiquette in these things. A champion may batter +his sparring-partners into insensibility if he pleases, but he must do +it with nonchalance. He must not appear to be really trying. + +And nothing could be more manifest than that Bugs Butler was trying. His +whole fighting soul was in his efforts to corner Ginger and destroy him. +The battle was raging across the ring and down the ring, and up the ring +and back again; yet always Ginger, like a storm-driven ship, contrived +somehow to weather the tempest. Out of the flurry of swinging arms he +emerged time after time bruised, bleeding, but fighting hard. + +For Bugs Butler's fury was defeating its object. Had he remained his +cool and scientific self, he could have demolished Ginger and cut +through his defence in a matter of seconds. But he had lapsed back into +the methods of his unskilled novitiate. He swung and missed, swung and +missed again, struck but found no vital spot. And now there was blood on +his face, too. In some wild melee the sacred fount had been tapped, and +his teeth gleamed through a crimson mist. + +The Wise Guys were beyond speech. They were leaning against one another, +punching each other feebly in the back. One was crying. + +And then suddenly the end came, as swiftly and unexpectedly as the +thing had begun. His wild swings had tired Bugs Butler, and with fatigue +prudence returned to him. His feet began once more their subtle weaving +in and out. Twice his left hand flickered home. A quick feint, a short, +jolting stab, and Ginger's guard was down and he was swaying in the +middle of the ring, his hands hanging and his knees a-quiver. + +Bugs Butler measured his distance, and Sally shut her eyes. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV. MR. ABRAHAMS RE-ENGAGES AN OLD EMPLOYEE + + + +1 + + + +The only real happiness, we are told, is to be obtained by bringing +happiness to others. Bugs Butler's mood, accordingly, when some thirty +hours after the painful episode recorded in the last chapter he awoke +from a state of coma in the ring at Jersey City to discover that Mr. Lew +Lucas had knocked him out in the middle of the third round, should have +been one of quiet contentment. His inability to block a short left-hook +followed by a right to the point of the jaw had ameliorated quite a +number of existences. + +Mr. Lew Lucas, for one, was noticeably pleased. So were Mr. Lucas's +seconds, one of whom went so far as to kiss him. And most of the crowd, +who had betted heavily on the champion, were delighted. Yet Bugs Butler +did not rejoice. It is not too much to say that his peevish bearing +struck a jarring note in the general gaiety. A heavy frown disfigured +his face as he slouched from the ring. + +But the happiness which he had spread went on spreading. The two Wise +Guys, who had been unable to attend the fight in person, received the +result on the ticker and exuberantly proclaimed themselves the richer +by five hundred dollars. The pimpled office-boy at the Fillmore Nicholas +Theatrical Enterprises Ltd. caused remark in the Subway by whooping +gleefully when he read the news in his morning paper, for he, too, had +been rendered wealthier by the brittleness of Mr. Butler's chin. And +it was with fierce satisfaction that Sally, breakfasting in her little +apartment, informed herself through the sporting page of the details of +the contender's downfall. She was not a girl who disliked many people, +but she had acquired a lively distaste for Bugs Butler. + +Lew Lucas seemed a man after her own heart. If he had been a personal +friend of Ginger's he could not, considering the brief time at his +disposal, have avenged him with more thoroughness. In round one he had +done all sorts of diverting things to Mr. Butler's left eye: in round +two he had continued the good work on that gentleman's body; and in +round three he had knocked him out. Could anyone have done more? Sally +thought not, and she drank Lew Lucas's health in a cup of coffee and +hoped his old mother was proud of him. + +The telephone bell rang at her elbow. She unhooked the receiver. + +"Hullo?" + +"Oh, hullo," said a voice. + +"Ginger!" cried Sally delightedly. + +"I say, I'm awfully glad you're back. I only got your letter this +morning. Found it at the boarding-house. I happened to look in there +and..." + +"Ginger," interrupted Sally, "your voice is music, but I want to see +you. Where are you?" + +"I'm at a chemist's shop across the street. I was wondering if..." + +"Come here at once!" + +"I say, may I? I was just going to ask." + +"You miserable creature, why haven't you been round to see me before?" + +"Well, as a matter of fact, I haven't been going about much for the last +day. You see..." + +"I know. Of course." Quick sympathy came into Sally's voice. She gave +a sidelong glance of approval and gratitude at the large picture of Lew +Lucas which beamed up at her from the morning paper. "You poor thing! +How are you?" + +"Oh, all right, thanks." + +"Well, hurry." + +There was a slight pause at the other end of the wire. + +"I say." + +"Well?" + +"I'm not much to look at, you know." + +"You never were. Stop talking and hurry over." + +"I mean to say..." + +Sally hung up the receiver firmly. She waited eagerly for some minutes, +and then footsteps came along the passage. They stopped at her door and +the bell rang. Sally ran to the door, flung it open, and recoiled in +consternation. + +"Oh, Ginger!" + +He had stated the facts accurately when he had said that he was not much +to look at. He gazed at her devotedly out of an unblemished right eye, +but the other was hidden altogether by a puffy swelling of dull purple. +A great bruise marred his left cheek-bone, and he spoke with some +difficulty through swollen lips. + +"It's all right, you know," he assured her. + +"It isn't. It's awful! Oh, you poor darling!" She clenched her teeth +viciously. "I wish he had killed him!" + +"Eh?" + +"I wish Lew Lucas or whatever his name is had murdered him. Brute!" + +"Oh, I don't know, you know." Ginger's sense of fairness compelled him +to defend his late employer against these harsh sentiments. "He isn't a +bad sort of chap, really. Bugs Butler, I mean." + +"Do you seriously mean to stand there and tell me you don't loathe the +creature?" + +"Oh, he's all right. See his point of view and all that. Can't blame +him, if you come to think of it, for getting the wind up a bit in the +circs. Bit thick, I mean to say, a sparring-partner going at him like +that. Naturally he didn't think it much of a wheeze. It was my fault +right along. Oughtn't to have done it, of course, but somehow, when he +started making an ass of me and I knew you were looking on... well, it +seemed a good idea to have a dash at doing something on my own. No right +to, of course. A sparring-partner isn't supposed..." + +"Sit down," said Sally. + +Ginger sat down. + +"Ginger," said Sally, "you're too good to live." + +"Oh, I say!" + +"I believe if someone sandbagged you and stole your watch and chain +you'd say there were faults on both sides or something. I'm just a cat, +and I say I wish your beast of a Bugs Butler had perished miserably. +I'd have gone and danced on his grave... But whatever made you go in for +that sort of thing?" + +"Well, it seemed the only job that was going at the moment. I've always +done a goodish bit of boxing and I was very fit and so on, and it looked +to me rather an opening. Gave me something to get along with. You get +paid quite fairly decently, you know, and it's rather a jolly life..." + +"Jolly? Being hammered about like that?" + +"Oh, you don't notice it much. I've always enjoyed scrapping rather. +And, you see, when your brother gave me the push..." + +Sally uttered an exclamation. + +"What an extraordinary thing it is--I went all the way out to White +Plains that afternoon to find Fillmore and tackle him about that and I +didn't say a word about it. And I haven't seen or been able to get hold +of him since." + +"No? Busy sort of cove, your brother." + +"Why did Fillmore let you go?" + +"Let me go? Oh, you mean... well, there was a sort of mix-up. A kind of +misunderstanding." + +"What happened?" + +"Oh, it was nothing. Just a..." + +"What happened?" + +Ginger's disfigured countenance betrayed embarrassment. He looked +awkwardly about the room. + +"It's not worth talking about." + +"It is worth talking about. I've a right to know. It was I who sent you +to Fillmore..." + +"Now that," said Ginger, "was jolly decent of you." + +"Don't interrupt! I sent you to Fillmore, and he had no business to let +you go without saying a word to me. What happened?" + +Ginger twiddled his fingers unhappily. + +"Well, it was rather unfortunate. You see, his wife--I don't know if you +know her?..." + +"Of course I know her." + +"Why, yes, you would, wouldn't you? Your brother's wife, I mean," +said Ginger acutely. "Though, as a matter of fact, you often find +sisters-in-law who won't have anything to do with one another. I know a +fellow..." + +"Ginger," said Sally, "it's no good your thinking you can get out of +telling me by rambling off on other subjects. I'm grim and resolute and +relentless, and I mean to get this story out of you if I have to use a +corkscrew. Fillmore's wife, you were saying..." + +Ginger came back reluctantly to the main theme. + +"Well, she came into the office one morning, and we started fooling +about..." + +"Fooling about?" + +"Well, kind of chivvying each other." + +"Chivvying?" + +"At least I was." + +"You were what?" + +"Sort of chasing her a bit, you know." + +Sally regarded this apostle of frivolity with amazement. + +"What do you mean?" + +Ginger's embarrassment increased. + +"The thing was, you see, she happened to trickle in rather quietly when +I happened to be looking at something, and I didn't know she was there +till she suddenly grabbed it..." + +"Grabbed what?" + +"The thing. The thing I happened to be looking at. She bagged it... +collared it... took it away from me, you know, and wouldn't give it back +and generally started to rot about a bit, so I rather began to chivvy +her to some extent, and I'd just caught her when your brother happened +to roll in. I suppose," said Ginger, putting two and two together, "he +had really come with her to the office and had happened to hang back for +a minute or two, to talk to somebody or something... well, of course, he +was considerably fed to see me apparently doing jiu-jitsu with his wife. +Enough to rattle any man, if you come to think of it," said Ginger, ever +fair-minded. "Well, he didn't say anything at the time, but a bit later +in the day he called me in and administered the push." + +Sally shook her head. + +"It sounds the craziest story to me. What was it that Mrs. Fillmore took +from you?" + +"Oh, just something." + +Sally rapped the table imperiously. + +"Ginger!" + +"Well, as a matter of fact," said her goaded visitor, "It was a +photograph." + +"Who of? Or, if you're particular, of whom?" + +"Well... you, to be absolutely accurate." + +"Me?" Sally stared. "But I've never given you a photograph of myself." + +Ginger's face was a study in scarlet and purple. + +"You didn't exactly give it to me," he mumbled. "When I say give, I +mean..." + +"Good gracious!" Sudden enlightenment came upon Sally. "That photograph +we were hunting for when I first came here! Had you stolen it all the +time?" + +"Why, yes, I did sort of pinch it..." + +"You fraud! You humbug! And you pretended to help me look for it." She +gazed at him almost with respect. "I never knew you were so deep and +snaky. I'm discovering all sorts of new things about you." + +There was a brief silence. Ginger, confession over, seemed a trifle +happier. + +"I hope you're not frightfully sick about it?" he said at length. "It +was lying about, you know, and I rather felt I must have it. Hadn't the +cheek to ask you for it, so..." + +"Don't apologize," said Sally cordially. "Great compliment. So I have +caused your downfall again, have I? I'm certainly your evil genius, +Ginger. I'm beginning to feel like a regular rag and a bone and a hank +of hair. First I egged you on to insult your family--oh, by the way, I +want to thank you about that. Now that I've met your Uncle Donald I can +see how public-spirited you were. I ruined your prospects there, and now +my fatal beauty--cabinet size--has led to your destruction once more. +It's certainly up to me to find you another job, I can see that." + +"No, really, I say, you mustn't bother. I shall be all right." + +"It's my duty. Now what is there that you really can do? Burglary, of +course, but it's not respectable. You've tried being a waiter and a +prize-fighter and a right-hand man, and none of those seems to be just +right. Can't you suggest anything?" + +Ginger shook his head. + +"I shall wangle something, I expect."' + +"Yes, but what? It must be something good this time. I don't want to be +walking along Broadway and come on you suddenly as a street-cleaner. I +don't want to send for an express-man and find you popping up. My +idea would be to go to my bank to arrange an overdraft and be told the +president could give me two minutes and crawl in humbly and find you +prezzing away to beat the band in a big chair. Isn't there anything in +the world that you can do that's solid and substantial and will keep you +out of the poor-house in your old age? Think!" + +"Of course, if I had a bit of capital..." + +"Ah! The business man! And what," inquired Sally, "would you do, Mr. +Morgan, if you had a bit of capital?" + +"Run a dog-thingummy," said Ginger promptly. + +"What's a dog-thingummy?" + +"Why, a thingamajig. For dogs, you know." + +Sally nodded. + +"Oh, a thingamajig for dogs? Now I understand. You will put things so +obscurely at first. Ginger, you poor fish, what are you raving about? +What on earth is a thingamajig for dogs?" + +"I mean a sort of place like fellows have. Breeding dogs, you know, and +selling them and winning prizes and all that. There are lots of them +about." + +"Oh, a kennels?" + +"Yes, a kennels." + +"What a weird mind you have, Ginger. You couldn't say kennels at first, +could you? That wouldn't have made it difficult enough. I suppose, if +anyone asked you where you had your lunch, you would say, 'Oh, at a +thingamajig for mutton chops'... Ginger, my lad, there is something in +this. I believe for the first time in our acquaintance you have spoken +something very nearly resembling a mouthful. You're wonderful with dogs, +aren't you?" + +"I'm dashed keen on them, and I've studied them a bit. As a matter of +fact, though it seems rather like swanking, there isn't much about dogs +that I don't know." + +"Of course. I believe you're a sort of honorary dog yourself. I could +tell it by the way you stopped that fight at Roville. You plunged into a +howling mass of about a million hounds of all species and just whispered +in their ears and they stopped at once. Why, the more one examines this, +the better it looks. I do believe it's the one thing you couldn't help +making a success of. It's very paying, isn't it?" + +"Works out at about a hundred per cent on the original outlay, I've been +told." + +"A hundred per cent? That sounds too much like something of Fillmore's +for comfort. Let's say ninety-nine and be conservative. Ginger, you +have hit it. Say no more. You shall be the Dog King, the biggest +thingamajigger for dogs in the country. But how do you start?" + +"Well, as a matter of fact, while I was up at White Plains, I ran into +a cove who had a place of the sort and wanted to sell out. That was what +made me think of it." + +"You must start to-day. Or early to-morrow." + +"Yes," said Ginger doubtfully. "Of course, there's the catch, you know." + +"What catch?" + +"The capital. You've got to have that. This fellow wouldn't sell out +under five thousand dollars." + +"I'll lend you five thousand dollars." + +"No!" said Ginger. + +Sally looked at him with exasperation. "Ginger, I'd like to slap you," +she said. It was maddening, this intrusion of sentiment into business +affairs. Why, simply because he was a man and she was a woman, +should she be restrained from investing money in a sound commercial +undertaking? If Columbus had taken up this bone-headed stand towards +Queen Isabella, America would never have been discovered. + +"I can't take five thousand dollars off you," said Ginger firmly. + +"Who's talking of taking it off me, as you call it?" stormed Sally. +"Can't you forget your burglarious career for a second? This isn't the +same thing as going about stealing defenceless girls' photographs. This +is business. I think you would make an enormous success of a dog-place, +and you admit you're good, so why make frivolous objections? Why +shouldn't I put money into a good thing? Don't you want me to get rich, +or what is it?" + +Ginger was becoming confused. Argument had never been his strong point. + +"But it's such a lot of money." + +"To you, perhaps. Not to me. I'm a plutocrat. Five thousand dollars! +What's five thousand dollars? I feed it to the birds." + +Ginger pondered woodenly for a while. His was a literal mind, and he +knew nothing of Sally's finances beyond the fact that when he had first +met her she had come into a legacy of some kind. Moreover, he had been +hugely impressed by Fillmore's magnificence. It seemed plain enough that +the Nicholases were a wealthy family. + +"I don't like it, you know," he said. + +"You don't have to like it," said Sally. "You just do it." + +A consoling thought flashed upon Ginger. + +"You'd have to let me pay you interest." + +"Let you? My lad, you'll have to pay me interest. What do you think this +is--a round game? It's a cold business deal." + +"Topping!" said Ginger relieved. "How about twenty-five per cent." + +"Don't be silly," said Sally quickly. "I want three." + +"No, that's all rot," protested Ginger. "I mean to say--three. I don't," +he went on, making a concession, "mind saying twenty." + +"If you insist, I'll make it five. Not more." + +"Well, ten, then?" + +"Five!" + +"Suppose," said Ginger insinuatingly, "I said seven?" + +"I never saw anyone like you for haggling," said Sally with disapproval. +"Listen! Six. And that's my last word." + +"Six?" + +"Six." + +Ginger did sums in his head. + +"But that would only work out at three hundred dollars a year. It isn't +enough." + +"What do you know about it? As if I hadn't been handling this sort of +deal in my life. Six! Do you agree?" + +"I suppose so." + +"Then that's settled. Is this man you talk about in New York?" + +"No, he's down on Long Island at a place on the south shore." + +"I mean, can you get him on the 'phone and clinch the thing?" + +"Oh, yes. I know his address, and I suppose his number's in the book." + +"Then go off at once and settle with him before somebody else snaps him +up. Don't waste a minute." + +Ginger paused at the door. + +"I say, you're absolutely sure about this?''' + +"Of course." + +"I mean to say..." + +"Get on," said Sally. + + + +2 + + + +The window of Sally's sitting-room looked out on to a street +which, while not one of the city's important arteries, was capable, +nevertheless, of affording a certain amount of entertainment to the +observer: and after Ginger had left, she carried the morning paper to +the window-sill and proceeded to divide her attention between a third +reading of the fight-report and a lazy survey of the outer world. It was +a beautiful day, and the outer world was looking its best. + +She had not been at her post for many minutes when a taxi-cab stopped +at the apartment-house, and she was surprised and interested to see her +brother Fillmore heave himself out of the interior. He paid the driver, +and the cab moved off, leaving him on the sidewalk casting a large +shadow in the sunshine. Sally was on the point of calling to him, when +his behaviour became so odd that astonishment checked her. + +From where she sat Fillmore had all the appearance of a man practising +the steps of a new dance, and sheer curiosity as to what he would do +next kept Sally watching in silence. First, he moved in a resolute sort +of way towards the front door; then, suddenly stopping, scuttled back. +This movement he repeated twice, after which he stood in deep thought +before making another dash for the door, which, like the others, came +to an abrupt end as though he had run into some invisible obstacle. And, +finally, wheeling sharply, he bustled off down the street and was lost +to view. + +Sally could make nothing of it. If Fillmore had taken the trouble to +come in a taxi-cab, obviously to call upon her, why had he abandoned the +idea at her very threshold? She was still speculating on this mystery +when the telephone-bell rang, and her brother's voice spoke huskily in +her ear. + +"Sally?" + +"Hullo, Fill. What are you going to call it?" + +"What am I... Call what?" + +"The dance you were doing outside here just now. It's your own +invention, isn't it?" + +"Did you see me?" said Fillmore, upset. + +"Of course I saw you. I was fascinated." + +"I--er--I was coming to have a talk with you. Sally..." + +Fillmore's voice trailed off. + +"Well, why didn't you?" + +There was a pause--on Fillmore's part, if the timbre of at his voice +correctly indicated his feelings, a pause of discomfort. Something was +plainly vexing Fillmore's great mind. + +"Sally," he said at last, and coughed hollowly into the receiver. + +"Yes." + +"I--that is to say, I have asked Gladys... Gladys will be coming to see +you very shortly. Will you be in?" + +"I'll stay in. How is Gladys? I'm longing to see her again." + +"She is very well. A trifle--a little upset." + +"Upset? What about?" + +"She will tell you when she arrives. I have just been 'phoning to her. +She is coming at once." There was another pause. "I'm afraid she has bad +news." + +"What news?" + +There was silence at the other end of the wire. + +"What news?" repeated Sally, a little sharply. She hated mysteries. + +But Fillmore had rung off. Sally hung up the receiver thoughtfully. She +was puzzled and anxious. However, there being nothing to be gained by +worrying, she carried the breakfast things into the kitchen and tried to +divert herself by washing up. Presently a ring at the door-bell brought +her out, to find her sister-in-law. + +Marriage, even though it had brought with it the lofty position of +partnership with the Hope of the American Stage, had effected no +noticeable alteration in the former Miss Winch. As Mrs. Fillmore she +was the same square, friendly creature. She hugged Sally in a muscular +manner and went on in the sitting-room. + +"Well, it's great seeing you again," she said. "I began to think you +were never coming back. What was the big idea, springing over to England +like that?" + +Sally had been expecting the question, and answered it with composure. + +"I wanted to help Mr. Faucitt." + +"Who's Mr. Faucitt?" + +"Hasn't Fillmore ever mentioned him? He was a dear old man at the +boarding-house, and his brother died and left him a dressmaking +establishment in London. He screamed to me to come and tell him what to +do about it. He has sold it now and is quite happy in the country." + +"Well, the trip's done you good," said Mrs. Fillmore. "You're prettier +than ever." + +There was a pause. Already, in these trivial opening exchanges, Sally +had sensed a suggestion of unwonted gravity in her companion. She missed +that careless whimsicality which had been the chief characteristic of +Miss Gladys Winch and seemed to have been cast off by Mrs. Fillmore +Nicholas. At their meeting, before she had spoken, Sally had not +noticed this, but now it was apparent that something was weighing on her +companion. Mrs. Fillmore's honest eyes were troubled. + +"What's the bad news?" asked Sally abruptly. She wanted to end the +suspense. "Fillmore was telling me over the 'phone that you had some bad +news for me." + +Mrs. Fillmore scratched at the carpet for a moment with the end of her +parasol without replying. When she spoke it was not in answer to the +question. + +"Sally, who's this man Carmyle over in England?" + +"Oh, did Fillmore tell you about him?" + +"He told me there was a rich fellow over in England who was crazy about +you and had asked you to marry him, and that you had turned him down." + +Sally's momentary annoyance faded. She could hardly, she felt, have +expected Fillmore to refrain from mentioning the matter to his wife. + +"Yes," she said. "That's true." + +"You couldn't write and say you've changed your mind?" + +Sally's annoyance returned. All her life she had been intensely +independent, resentful of interference with her private concerns. + +"I suppose I could if I had--but I haven't. Did Fillmore tell you to try +to talk me round?" + +"Oh, I'm not trying to talk you round," said Mrs. Fillmore quickly. +"Goodness knows, I'm the last person to try and jolly anyone into +marrying anybody if they didn't feel like it. I've seen too many +marriages go wrong to do that. Look at Elsa Doland." + +Sally's heart jumped as if an exposed nerve had been touched. + +"Elsa?" she stammered, and hated herself because her voice shook. +"Has--has her marriage gone wrong?" + +"Gone all to bits," said Mrs. Fillmore shortly. "You remember she +married Gerald Foster, the man who wrote 'The Primrose Way'?" + +Sally with an effort repressed an hysterical laugh. + +"Yes, I remember," she said. + +"Well, it's all gone bloo-ey. I'll tell you about that in a minute. +Coming back to this man in England, if you're in any doubt about it... +I mean, you can't always tell right away whether you're fond of a man or +not... When first I met Fillmore, I couldn't see him with a spy-glass, +and now he's just the whole shooting-match... But that's not what I +wanted to talk about. I was saying one doesn't always know one's +own mind at first, and if this fellow really is a good fellow... and +Fillmore tells me he's got all the money in the world..." + +Sally stopped her. + +"No, it's no good. I don't want to marry Mr. Carmyle." + +"That's that, then," said Mrs. Fillmore. "It's a pity, though." + +"Why are you taking it so much to heart?" said Sally with a nervous +laugh. + +"Well..." Mrs. Fillmore paused. Sally's anxiety was growing. It must, +she realized, be something very serious indeed that had happened if it +had the power to make her forthright sister-in-law disjointed in her +talk. "You see..." went on Mrs. Fillmore, and stopped again. "Gee! I'm +hating this!" she murmured. + +"What is it? I don't understand." + +"You'll find it's all too darned clear by the time I'm through," said +Mrs. Fillmore mournfully. "If I'm going to explain this thing, I +guess I'd best start at the beginning. You remember that revue of +Fillmore's--the one we both begged him not to put on. It flopped!" + +"Oh!" + +"Yes. It flopped on the road and died there. Never got to New York at +all. Ike Schumann wouldn't let Fillmore have a theatre. The book wanted +fixing and the numbers wanted fixing and the scenery wasn't right: and +while they were tinkering with all that there was trouble about the +cast and the Actors Equity closed the show. Best thing that could have +happened, really, and I was glad at the time, because going on with +it would only have meant wasting more money, and it had cost a fortune +already. After that Fillmore put on a play of Gerald Foster's and that +was a frost, too. It ran a week at the Booth. I hear the new piece he's +got in rehearsal now is no good either. It's called 'The Wild Rose,' or +something. But Fillmore's got nothing to do with that." + +"But..." Sally tried to speak, but Mrs. Fillmore went on. + +"Don't talk just yet, or I shall never get this thing straight. Well, +you know Fillmore, poor darling. Anyone else would have pulled in his +horns and gone slow for a spell, but he's one of those fellows whose +horse is always going to win the next race. The big killing is always +just round the corner with him. Funny how you can see what a chump a man +is and yet love him to death... I remember saying something like that to +you before... He thought he could get it all back by staging this fight +of his that came off in Jersey City last night. And if everything had +gone right he might have got afloat again. But it seems as if he can't +touch anything without it turning to mud. On the very day before the +fight was to come off, the poor mutt who was going against the champion +goes and lets a sparring-partner of his own knock him down and fool +around with him. With all the newspaper men there too! You probably +saw about it in the papers. It made a great story for them. Well, that +killed the whole thing. The public had never been any too sure that this +fellow Bugs Butler had a chance of putting up a scrap with the champion +that would be worth paying to see; and, when they read that he couldn't +even stop his sparring-partners slamming him all around the place they +simply decided to stay away. Poor old Fill! It was a finisher for +him. The house wasn't a quarter full, and after he'd paid these two +pluguglies their guarantees, which they insisted on having before they'd +so much as go into the ring, he was just about cleaned out. So there you +are!" + +Sally had listened with dismay to this catalogue of misfortunes. + +"Oh, poor Fill!" she cried. "How dreadful!" + +"Pretty tough." + +"But 'The Primrose Way' is a big success, isn't it?" said Sally, anxious +to discover something of brightness in the situation. + +"It was." Mrs. Fillmore flushed again. "This is the part I hate having +to tell you." + +"It was? Do you mean it isn't still? I thought Elsa had made such a +tremendous hit. I read about it when I was over in London. It was even +in one of the English papers." + +"Yes, she made a hit all right," said Mrs. Fillmore drily. "She made +such a hit that all the other managements in New York were after her +right away, and Fillmore had hardly sailed when she handed in her notice +and signed up with Goble and Cohn for a new piece they are starring her +in." + +"Ah, she couldn't!" cried Sally. + +"My dear, she did! She's out on the road with it now. I had to break the +news to poor old Fillmore at the dock when he landed. It was rather a +blow. I must say it wasn't what I would call playing the game. I know +there isn't supposed to be any sentiment in business, but after all we +had given Elsa her big chance. But Fillmore wouldn't put her name up +over the theatre in electrics, and Goble and Cohn made it a clause in +her contract that they would, so nothing else mattered. People are like +that." + +"But Elsa... She used not to be like that." + +"They all get that way. They must grab success if it's to be grabbed. +I suppose you can't blame them. You might just as well expect a cat to +keep off catnip. Still, she might have waited to the end of the New York +run." Mrs. Fillmore put out her hand and touched Sally's. "Well, I've +got it out now," she said, "and, believe me, it was one rotten job. You +don't know how sorry I am. Sally. I wouldn't have had it happen for a +million dollars. Nor would Fillmore. I'm not sure that I blame him for +getting cold feet and backing out of telling you himself. He just hadn't +the nerve to come and confess that he had fooled away your money. He was +hoping all along that this fight would pan out big and that he'd be +able to pay you back what you had loaned him, but things didn't happen +right." + +Sally was silent. She was thinking how strange it was that this room in +which she had hoped to be so happy had been from the first moment of her +occupancy a storm centre of bad news and miserable disillusionment. In +this first shock of the tidings, it was the disillusionment that hurt +most. She had always been so fond of Elsa, and Elsa had always seemed +so fond of her. She remembered that letter of Elsa's with all its +protestations of gratitude... It wasn't straight. It was horrible. +Callous, selfish, altogether horrible... + +"It's..." She choked, as a rush of indignation brought the tears to her +eyes. "It's... beastly! I'm... I'm not thinking about my money. That's +just bad luck. But Elsa..." + +Mrs. Fillmore shrugged her square shoulders. + +"Well, it's happening all the time in the show business," she said. "And +in every other business, too, I guess, if one only knew enough about +them to be able to say. Of course, it hits you hard because Elsa was a +pal of yours, and you're thinking she might have considered you after +all you've done for her. I can't say I'm much surprised myself." Mrs. +Fillmore was talking rapidly, and dimly Sally understood that she was +talking so that talk would carry her over this bad moment. Silence now +would have been unendurable. "I was in the company with her, and it +sometimes seems to me as if you can't get to know a person right through +till you've been in the same company with them. Elsa's all right, but +she's two people really, like these dual identity cases you read about. +She's awfully fond of you. I know she is. She was always saying so, +and it was quite genuine. If it didn't interfere with business there's +nothing she wouldn't do for you. But when it's a case of her career you +don't count. Nobody counts. Not even her husband. Now that's funny. +If you think that sort of thing funny. Personally, it gives me the +willies." + +"What's funny?" asked Sally, dully. + +"Well, you weren't there, so you didn't see it, but I was on the spot +all the time, and I know as well as I know anything that he simply +married her because he thought she could get him on in the game. He +hardly paid any attention to her at all till she was such a riot in +Chicago, and then he was all over her. And now he's got stung. She +throws down his show and goes off to another fellow's. It's like +marrying for money and finding the girl hasn't any. And she's got stung, +too, in a way, because I'm pretty sure she married him mostly because +she thought he was going to be the next big man in the play-writing +business and could boost her up the ladder. And now it doesn't look as +though he had another success in him. The result is they're at outs. I +hear he's drinking. Somebody who'd seen him told me he had gone all to +pieces. You haven't seen him, I suppose?" + +"No." + +"I thought maybe you might have run into him. He lives right opposite." + +Sally clutched at the arm of her chair. + +"Lives right opposite? Gerald Foster? What do you mean?" + +"Across the passage there," said Mrs. Fillmore, jerking her thumb at the +door. "Didn't you know? That's right, I suppose you didn't. They moved +in after you had beaten it for England. Elsa wanted to be near you, and +she was tickled to death when she found there was an apartment to be had +right across from you. Now, that just proves what I was saying a while +ago about Elsa. If she wasn't fond of you, would she go out of her way +to camp next door? And yet, though she's so fond of you, she doesn't +hesitate about wrecking your property by quitting the show when she sees +a chance of doing herself a bit of good. It's funny, isn't it?" + +The telephone-bell, tinkling sharply, rescued Sally from the necessity +of a reply. She forced herself across the room to answer it. + +"Hullo?" + +Ginger's voice spoke jubilantly. + +"Hullo. Are you there? I say, it's all right, about that binge, you +know." + +"Oh, yes?" + +"That dog fellow, you know," said Ginger, with a slight diminution of +exuberance. His sensitive ear had seemed to detect a lack of animation +in her voice. "I've just been talking to him over the 'phone, and it's +all settled. If," he added, with a touch of doubt, "you still feel like +going into it, I mean." + +There was an instant in which Sally hesitated, but it was only an +instant. + +"Why, of course," she said, steadily. "Why should you think I had +changed my mind?" + +"Well, I thought... that is to say, you seemed... oh, I don't know." + +"You imagine things. I was a little worried about something when you +called me up, and my mind wasn't working properly. Of course, go ahead +with it. Ginger. I'm delighted." + +"I say, I'm awfully sorry you're worried." + +"Oh. it's all right." + +"Something bad?" + +"Nothing that'll kill me. I'm young and strong." + +Ginger was silent for a moment. + +"I say, I don't want to butt in, but can I do anything?" + +"No, really, Ginger, I know you would do anything you could, but this +is just something I must worry through by myself. When do you go down to +this place?" + +"I was thinking of popping down this afternoon, just to take a look +round." + +"Let me know what train you're making and I'll come and see you off." + +"That's ripping of you. Right ho. Well, so long." + +"So long," said Sally. + +Mrs. Fillmore, who had been sitting in that state of suspended animation +which comes upon people who are present at a telephone conversation +which has nothing to do with themselves, came to life as Sally replaced +the receiver. + +"Sally," she said, "I think we ought to have a talk now about what +you're going to do." + +Sally was not feeling equal to any discussion of the future. All she +asked of the world at the moment was to be left alone. + +"Oh, that's all right. I shall manage. You ought to be worrying about +Fillmore." + +"Fillmore's got me to look after him," said Gladys, with quiet +determination. "You're the one that's on my mind. I lay awake all last +night thinking about you. As far as I can make out from Fillmore, you've +still a few thousand dollars left. Well, as it happens, I can put you on +to a really good thing. I know a girl..." + +"I'm afraid," interrupted Sally, "all the rest of my money, what there +is of it, is tied up." + +"You can't get hold of it?" + +"No." + +"But listen," said Mrs. Fillmore, urgently. "This is a really good +thing. This girl I know started an interior decorating business some +time ago and is pulling in the money in handfuls. But she wants more +capital, and she's willing to let go of a third of the business to +anyone who'll put in a few thousand. She won't have any difficulty +getting it, but I 'phoned her this morning to hold off till I'd heard +from you. Honestly, Sally, it's the chance of a lifetime. It would put +you right on easy street. Isn't there really any way you could get your +money out of this other thing and take on this deal?" + +"There really isn't. I'm awfully obliged to you, Gladys dear, but it's +impossible." + +"Well," said Mrs. Fillmore, prodding the carpet energetically with her +parasol, "I don't know what you've gone into, but, unless they've given +you a share in the Mint or something, you'll be losing by not making the +switch. You're sure you can't do it?" + +"I really can't." + +Mrs. Fillmore rose, plainly disappointed. + +"Well, you know best, of course. Gosh! What a muddle everything is. +Sally," she said, suddenly stopping at the door, "you're not going to +hate poor old Fillmore over this, are you?" + +"Why, of course not. The whole thing was just bad luck." + +"He's worried stiff about it." + +"Well, give him my love, and tell him not to be so silly." + +Mrs. Fillmore crossed the room and kissed Sally impulsively. + +"You're an angel," she said. "I wish there were more like you. But I +guess they've lost the pattern. Well, I'll go back and tell Fillmore +that. It'll relieve him." + +The door closed, and Sally sat down with her chin in her hands to think. + + + +3 + + + +Mr. Isadore Abrahams, the founder and proprietor of that deservedly +popular dancing resort poetically named "The Flower Garden," leaned back +in his chair with a contented sigh and laid down the knife and fork +with which he had been assailing a plateful of succulent goulash. He was +dining, as was his admirable custom, in the bosom of his family at his +residence at Far Rockaway. Across the table, his wife, Rebecca, beamed +at him over her comfortable plinth of chins, and round the table his +children, David, Jacob, Morris and Saide, would have beamed at him +if they had not been too busy at the moment ingurgitating goulash. +A genial, honest, domestic man was Mr. Abrahams, a credit to the +community. + +"Mother," he said. + +"Pa?" said Mrs. Abrahams. + +"Knew there was something I'd meant to tell you," said Mr. Abrahams, +absently chasing a piece of bread round his plate with a stout finger. +"You remember that girl I told you about some time back--girl working at +the Garden--girl called Nicholas, who came into a bit of money and threw +up her job..." + +"I remember. You liked her. Jakie, dear, don't gobble." + +"Ain't gobbling," said Master Abrahams. + +"Everybody liked her," said Mr. Abrahams. "The nicest girl I ever hired, +and I don't hire none but nice girls, because the Garden's a nice place, +and I like to run it nice. I wouldn't give you a nickel for any of your +tough joints where you get nothing but low-lifes and scare away all the +real folks. Everybody liked Sally Nicholas. Always pleasant and always +smiling, and never anything but the lady. It was a treat to have her +around. Well, what do you think?" + +"Dead?" inquired Mrs. Abrahams, apprehensively. The story had sounded to +her as though it were heading that way. "Wipe your mouth, Jakie dear." + +"No, not dead," said Mr. Abrahams, conscious for the first time that the +remainder of his narrative might be considered by a critic something +of an anti-climax and lacking in drama. "But she was in to see me this +afternoon and wants her job back." + +"Ah!" said Mrs. Abrahams, rather tonelessly. An ardent supporter of the +local motion-picture palace, she had hoped for a slightly more gingery +denouement, something with a bit more punch. + +"Yes, but don't it show you?" continued Mr. Abrahams, gallantly trying +to work up the interest. "There's this girl, goes out of my place not +more'n a year ago, with a good bank-roll in her pocket, and here she is, +back again, all of it spent. Don't it show you what a tragedy life is, +if you see what I mean, and how careful one ought to be about money? +It's what I call a human document. Goodness knows how she's been and +gone and spent it all. I'd never have thought she was the sort of girl +to go gadding around. Always seemed to me to be kind of sensible." + +"What's gadding, Pop?" asked Master Jakie, the goulash having ceased to +chain his interest. + +"Well, she wanted her job back and I gave it to her, and glad to get her +back again. There's class to that girl. She's the sort of girl I want +in the place. Don't seem quite to have so much get-up in her as she used +to... seems kind of quieted down... but she's got class, and I'm glad +she's back. I hope she'll stay. But don't it show you?" + +"Ah!" said Mrs. Abrahams, with more enthusiasm than before. It had not +worked out such a bad story after all. In its essentials it was not +unlike the film she had seen the previous evening--Gloria Gooch in "A +Girl against the World." + +"Pop!" said Master Abrahams. + +"Yes, Jakie?" + +"When I'm grown up, I won't never lose no money. I'll put it in the bank +and save it." + +The slight depression caused by the contemplation of Sally's troubles +left Mr. Abrahams as mist melts beneath a sunbeam. + +"That's a good boy, Jakie," he said. + +He felt in his waistcoat pocket, found a dime, put it back again, and +bent forward and patted Master Abrahams on the head. + + + + +CHAPTER XV. UNCLE DONALD SPEAKS HIS MIND + + + +There is in certain men--and Bruce Carmyle was one of them--a quality of +resilience, a sturdy refusal to acknowledge defeat, which aids them as +effectively in affairs of the heart as in encounters of a sterner and +more practical kind. As a wooer, Bruce Carmyle resembled that durable +type of pugilist who can only give of his best after he has received +at least one substantial wallop on some tender spot. Although Sally had +refused his offer of marriage quite definitely at Monk's Crofton, it had +never occurred to him to consider the episode closed. All his life he +had been accustomed to getting what he wanted, and he meant to get it +now. + +He was quite sure that he wanted Sally. There had been moments when +he had been conscious of certain doubts, but in the smart of temporary +defeat these had vanished. That streak of Bohemianism in her which from +time to time since their first meeting had jarred upon his orderly +mind was forgotten; and all that Mr. Carmyle could remember was the +brightness of her eyes, the jaunty lift of her chin, and the gallant +trimness of her. Her gay prettiness seemed to flick at him like a whip +in the darkness of wakeful nights, lashing him to pursuit. And quietly +and methodically, like a respectable wolf settling on the trail of a Red +Riding Hood, he prepared to pursue. Delicacy and imagination might have +kept him back, but in these qualities he had never been strong. One +cannot have everything. + +His preparations for departure, though he did his best to make them +swiftly and secretly, did not escape the notice of the Family. In many +English families there seems to exist a system of inter-communication +and news-distribution like that of those savage tribes in Africa who +pass the latest item of news and interest from point to point over +miles of intervening jungle by some telepathic method never properly +explained. On his last night in London, there entered to Bruce +Carmyle at his apartment in South Audley Street, the Family's chosen +representative, the man to whom the Family pointed with pride--Uncle +Donald, in the flesh. + +There were two hundred and forty pounds of the flesh Uncle Donald was +in, and the chair in which he deposited it creaked beneath its burden. +Once, at Monk's Crofton, Sally had spoiled a whole morning for her +brother Fillmore, by indicating Uncle Donald as the exact image of +what he would be when he grew up. A superstition, cherished from early +schooldays, that he had a weak heart had caused the Family's managing +director to abstain from every form of exercise for nearly fifty years; +and, as he combined with a distaste for exercise one of the three +heartiest appetites in the south-western postal division of London, +Uncle Donald, at sixty-two, was not a man one would willingly have +lounging in one's armchairs. Bruce Carmyle's customary respectfulness +was tinged with something approaching dislike as he looked at him. + +Uncle Donald's walrus moustache heaved gently upon his laboured breath, +like seaweed on a ground-swell. There had been stairs to climb. + +"What's this? What's this?" he contrived to ejaculate at last. "You +packing?" + +"Yes," said Mr. Carmyle, shortly. For the first time in his life he was +conscious of that sensation of furtive guilt which was habitual with his +cousin Ginger when in the presence of this large, mackerel-eyed man. + +"You going away?" + +"Yes." + +"Where you going?" + +"America." + +"When you going?" + +"To-morrow morning." + +"Why you going?" + +This dialogue has been set down as though it had been as brisk and +snappy as any cross-talk between vaudeville comedians, but in reality +Uncle Donald's peculiar methods of conversation had stretched it over +a period of nearly three minutes: for after each reply and before each +question he had puffed and sighed and inhaled his moustache with +such painful deliberation that his companion's nerves were finding it +difficult to bear up under the strain. + +"You're going after that girl," said Uncle Donald, accusingly. + +Bruce Carmyle flushed darkly. And it is interesting to record that at +this moment there flitted through his mind the thought that Ginger's +behaviour at Bleke's Coffee House, on a certain notable occasion, had +not been so utterly inexcusable as he had supposed. There was no doubt +that the Family's Chosen One could be trying. + +"Will you have a whisky and soda, Uncle Donald?" he said, by way of +changing the conversation. + +"Yes," said his relative, in pursuance of a vow he had made in the early +eighties never to refuse an offer of this kind. "Gimme!" + +You would have thought that that would have put matters on a pleasanter +footing. But no. Having lapped up the restorative, Uncle Donald returned +to the attack quite un-softened. + +"Never thought you were a fool before," he said severely. + +Bruce Carmyle's proud spirit chafed. This sort of interview, which had +become a commonplace with his cousin Ginger, was new to him. Hitherto, +his actions had received neither criticism nor been subjected to it. + +"I'm not a fool." + +"You are a fool. A damn fool," continued Uncle Donald, specifying more +exactly. "Don't like the girl. Never did. Not a nice girl. Didn't like +her. Right from the first." + +"Need we discuss this?" said Bruce Carmyle, dropping, as he was apt to +do, into the grand manner. + +The Head of the Family drank in a layer of moustache and blew it out +again. + +"Need we discuss it?" he said with asperity. "We're going to discuss it! +Whatch think I climbed all these blasted stairs for with my weak heart? +Gimme another!" + +Mr. Carmyle gave him another. + +"'S a bad business," moaned Uncle Donald, having gone through the +movements once more. "Shocking bad business. If your poor father were +alive, whatch think he'd say to your tearing across the world after this +girl? I'll tell you what he'd say. He'd say... What kind of whisky's +this?" + +"O'Rafferty Special." + +"New to me. Not bad. Quite good. Sound. Mellow. Wherej get it?" + +"Bilby's in Oxford Street." + +"Must order some. Mellow. He'd say... well, God knows what he'd say. +Whatch doing it for? Whatch doing it for? That's what I can't see. None +of us can see. Puzzles your uncle George. Baffles your aunt Geraldine. +Nobody can understand it. Girl's simply after your money. Anyone can see +that." + +"Pardon me, Uncle Donald," said Mr. Carmyle, stiffly, "but that is +surely rather absurd. If that were the case, why should she have refused +me at Monk's Crofton?" + +"Drawing you on," said Uncle Donald, promptly. "Luring you on. +Well-known trick. Girl in 1881, when I was at Oxford, tried to lure me +on. If I hadn't had some sense and a weak heart... Whatch know of this +girl? Whatch know of her? That's the point. Who is she? Wherej meet +her?" + +"I met her at Roville, in France." + +"Travelling with her family?" + +"Travelling alone," said Bruce Carmyle, reluctantly. + +"Not even with that brother of hers? Bad!" said Uncle Donald. "Bad, +bad!" + +"American girls are accustomed to more independence than English girls." + +"That young man," said Uncle Donald, pursuing a train of thought, "is +going to be fat one of these days, if he doesn't look out. Travelling +alone, was she? What did you do? Catch her eye on the pier?" + +"Really, Uncle Donald!" + +"Well, must have got to know her somehow." + +"I was introduced to her by Lancelot. She was a friend of his." + +"Lancelot!" exploded Uncle Donald, quivering all over like a smitten +jelly at the loathed name. "Well, that shows you what sort of a girl she +is. Any girl that would be a friend of... Unpack!" + +"I beg your pardon?" + +"Unpack! Mustn't go on with this foolery. Out of the question. Find some +girl make you a good wife. Your aunt Mary's been meeting some people +name of Bassington-Bassington, related Kent Bassington-Bassingtons... +eldest daughter charming girl, just do for you." + +Outside the pages of the more old-fashioned type of fiction nobody ever +really ground his teeth, but Bruce Carmyle came nearer to it at that +moment than anyone had ever come before. He scowled blackly, and the +last trace of suavity left him. + +"I shall do nothing of the kind," he said briefly. "I sail to-morrow." + +Uncle Donald had had a previous experience of being defied by a nephew, +but it had not accustomed him to the sensation. He was aware of an +unpleasant feeling of impotence. Nothing is harder than to know what to +do next when defied. + +"Eh?" he said. + +Mr. Carmyle having started to defy, evidently decided to make a good job +of it. + +"I am over twenty-one," said he. "I am financially independent. I shall +do as I please." + +"But, consider!" pleaded Uncle Donald, painfully conscious of the +weakness of his words. "Reflect!" + +"I have reflected." + +"Your position in the county..." + +"I've thought of that." + +"You could marry anyone you pleased." + +"I'm going to." + +"You are determined to go running off to God-knows-where after this Miss +I-can't-even-remember-her-dam-name?" + +"Yes." + +"Have you considered," said Uncle Donald, portentously, "that you owe a +duty to the Family." + +Bruce Carmyle's patience snapped and he sank like a stone to absolutely +Gingerian depths of plain-spokenness. + +"Oh, damn the Family!" he cried. + +There was a painful silence, broken only by the relieved sigh of the +armchair as Uncle Donald heaved himself out of it. + +"After that," said Uncle Donald, "I have nothing more to say." + +"Good!" said Mr. Carmyle rudely, lost to all shame. + +"'Cept this. If you come back married to that girl, I'll cut you in +Piccadilly. By George, I will!" + +He moved to the door. Bruce Carmyle looked down his nose without +speaking. A tense moment. + +"What," asked Uncle Donald, his fingers on the handle, "did you say it +was called?" + +"What was what called?" + +"That whisky." + +"O'Rafferty Special." + +"And wherj get it?" + +"Bilby's, in Oxford Street." + +"I'll make a note of it," said Uncle Donald. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI. AT THE FLOWER GARDEN + + + +1 + + + +"And after all I've done for her," said Mr. Reginald Cracknell, his +voice tremulous with self-pity and his eyes moist with the combined +effects of anguish and over-indulgence in his celebrated private stock, +"after all I've done for her she throws me down." + +Sally did not reply. The orchestra of the Flower Garden was of a calibre +that discouraged vocal competition; and she was having, moreover, +too much difficulty in adjusting her feet to Mr. Cracknell's erratic +dance-steps to employ her attention elsewhere. They manoeuvred jerkily +past the table where Miss Mabel Hobson, the Flower Garden's newest +"hostess," sat watching the revels with a distant hauteur. Miss Hobson +was looking her most regal in old gold and black, and a sorrowful gulp +escaped the stricken Mr. Cracknell as he shambled beneath her eye. + +"If I told you," he moaned in Sally's ear, "what... was that your ankle? +Sorry! Don't know what I'm doing to-night... If I told you what I had +spent on that woman, you wouldn't believe it. And then she throws me +down. And all because I said I didn't like her in that hat. She hasn't +spoken to me for a week, and won't answer when I call up on the 'phone. +And I was right, too. It was a rotten hat. Didn't suit her a bit. But +that," said Mr. Cracknell, morosely, "is a woman all over!" + +Sally uttered a stifled exclamation as his wandering foot descended on +hers before she could get it out of the way. Mr. Cracknell interpreted +the ejaculation as a protest against the sweeping harshness of his last +remark, and gallantly tried to make amends. + +"I don't mean you're like that," he said. "You're different. I could see +that directly I saw you. You have a sympathetic nature. That's why I'm +telling you all this. You're a sensible and broad-minded girl and can +understand. I've done everything for that woman. I got her this job as +hostess here--you wouldn't believe what they pay her. I starred her in +a show once. Did you see those pearls she was wearing? I gave her those. +And she won't speak to me. Just because I didn't like her hat. I wish +you could have seen that hat. You would agree with me, I know, because +you're a sensible, broad-minded girl and understand hats. I don't know +what to do. I come here every night." Sally was aware of this. She had +seen him often, but this was the first time that Lee Schoenstein, the +gentlemanly master of ceremonies, had inflicted him on her. "I come here +every night and dance past her table, but she won't look at me. What," +asked Mr. Cracknell, tears welling in his pale eyes, "would you do about +it?" + +"I don't know," said Sally, frankly. + +"Nor do I. I thought you wouldn't, because you're a sensible, +broad-minded... I mean, nor do I. I'm having one last try to-night, if +you can keep a secret. You won't tell anyone, will you?" pleaded Mr. +Cracknell, urgently. "But I know you won't because you're a sensible... +I'm giving her a little present. Having it brought here to-night. Little +present. That ought to soften her, don't you think?" + +"A big one would do it better." + +Mr. Cracknell kicked her on the shin in a dismayed sort of way. + +"I never thought of that. Perhaps you're right. But it's too late now. +Still, it might. Or wouldn't it? Which do you think?" + +"Yes," said Sally. + +"I thought as much," said Mr. Cracknell. + +The orchestra stopped with a thump and a bang, leaving Mr. Cracknell +clapping feebly in the middle of the floor. Sally slipped back to her +table. Her late partner, after an uncertain glance about him, as if +he had mislaid something but could not remember what, zigzagged off in +search of his own seat. The noise of many conversations, drowned by the +music, broke out with renewed vigour. The hot, close air was full of +voices; and Sally, pressing her hands on her closed eyes, was reminded +once more that she had a headache. + +Nearly a month had passed since her return to Mr. Abrahams' employment. +It had been a dull, leaden month, a monotonous succession of lifeless +days during which life had become a bad dream. In some strange nightmare +fashion, she seemed nowadays to be cut off from her kind. It was weeks +since she had seen a familiar face. None of the companions of her +old boarding-house days had crossed her path. Fillmore, no doubt from +uneasiness of conscience, had not sought her out, and Ginger was working +out his destiny on the south shore of Long Island. + +She lowered her hands and opened her eyes and looked at the room. It was +crowded, as always. The Flower Garden was one of the many establishments +of the same kind which had swum to popularity on the rising flood of +New York's dancing craze; and doubtless because, as its proprietor had +claimed, it was a nice place and run nice, it had continued, unlike many +of its rivals, to enjoy unvarying prosperity. In its advertisement, +it described itself as "a supper-club for after-theatre dining and +dancing," adding that "large and spacious, and sumptuously appointed," +it was "one of the town's wonder-places, with its incomparable +dance-floor, enchanting music, cuisine, and service de luxe." From which +it may be gathered, even without his personal statements to that effect, +that Isadore Abrahams thought well of the place. + +There had been a time when Sally had liked it, too. In her first period +of employment there she had found it diverting, stimulating and full of +entertainment. But in those days she had never had headaches or, what +was worse, this dreadful listless depression which weighed her down and +made her nightly work a burden. + +"Miss Nicholas." + +The orchestra, never silent for long at the Flower Garden, had started +again, and Lee Schoenstein, the master of ceremonies, was presenting a +new partner. She got up mechanically. + +"This is the first time I have been in this place," said the man, as +they bumped over the crowded floor. He was big and clumsy, of course. +To-night it seemed to Sally that the whole world was big and clumsy. +"It's a swell place. I come from up-state myself. We got nothing like +this where I come from." He cleared a space before him, using Sally as +a battering-ram, and Sally, though she had not enjoyed her recent +excursion with Mr. Cracknell, now began to look back to it almost with +wistfulness. This man was undoubtedly the worst dancer in America. + +"Give me li'l old New York," said the man from up-state, +unpatriotically. "It's good enough for me. I been to some swell shows +since I got to town. You seen this year's 'Follies'?" + +"No." + +"You go," said the man earnestly. "You go! Take it from me, it's a swell +show. You seen 'Myrtle takes a Turkish Bath'?" + +"I don't go to many theatres." + +"You go! It's a scream. I been to a show every night since I got here. +Every night regular. Swell shows all of 'em, except this last one. +I cert'nly picked a lemon to-night all right. I was taking a chance, +y'see, because it was an opening. Thought it would be something to +say, when I got home, that I'd been to a New York opening. Set me back +two-seventy-five, including tax, and I wish I'd got it in my kick +right now. 'The Wild Rose,' they called it," he said satirically, as +if exposing a low subterfuge on the part of the management. "'The Wild +Rose!' It sure made me wild all right. Two dollars seventy-five tossed +away, just like that." + +Something stirred in Sally's memory. Why did that title seem so +familiar? Then, with a shock, she remembered. It was Gerald's new play. +For some time after her return to New York, she had been haunted by the +fear lest, coming out of her apartment, she might meet him coming out of +his; and then she had seen a paragraph in her morning paper which had +relieved her of this apprehension. Gerald was out on the road with a new +play, and "The Wild Rose," she was almost sure, was the name of it. + +"Is that Gerald Foster's play?" she asked quickly. + +"I don't know who wrote it," said her partner, "but let me tell you he's +one lucky guy to get away alive. There's fellows breaking stones on the +Ossining Road that's done a lot less to deserve a sentence. Wild Rose! +I'll tell the world it made me go good and wild," said the man from +up-state, an economical soul who disliked waste and was accustomed to +spread out his humorous efforts so as to give them every chance. "Why, +before the second act was over, the people were beating it for the +exits, and if it hadn't been for someone shouting 'Women and children +first' there'd have been a panic." + +Sally found herself back at her table without knowing clearly how she +had got there. + +"Miss Nicholas." + +She started to rise, and was aware suddenly that this was not the voice +of duty calling her once more through the gold teeth of Mr. Schoenstein. +The man who had spoken her name had seated himself beside her, and was +talking in precise, clipped accents, oddly familiar. The mist cleared +from her eyes and she recognized Bruce Carmyle. + + + +2 + + + +"I called at your place," Mr. Carmyle was saying, "and the hall porter +told me that you were here, so I ventured to follow you. I hope you do +not mind? May I smoke?" + +He lit a cigarette with something of an air. His fingers trembled as he +raised the match, but he flattered himself that there was nothing +else in his demeanour to indicate that he was violently excited. +Bruce Carmyle's ideal was the strong man who can rise superior to his +emotions. He was alive to the fact that this was an embarrassing moment, +but he was determined not to show that he appreciated it. He cast a +sideways glance at Sally, and thought that never, not even in the garden +at Monk's Crofton on a certain momentous occasion, had he seen her +looking prettier. Her face was flushed and her eyes aflame. The stout +wraith of Uncle Donald, which had accompanied Mr. Carmyle on this +expedition of his, faded into nothingness as he gazed. + +There was a pause. Mr. Carmyle, having lighted his cigarette, puffed +vigorously. + +"When did you land?" asked Sally, feeling the need of saying something. +Her mind was confused. She could not have said whether she was glad +or sorry that he was there. Glad, she thought, on the whole. There +was something in his dark, cool, stiff English aspect that gave her a +curious feeling of relief. He was so unlike Mr. Cracknell and the man +from up-state and so calmly remote from the feverish atmosphere in which +she lived her nights that it was restful to look at him. + +"I landed to-night," said Bruce Carmyle, turning and faced her squarely. + +"To-night!" + +"We docked at ten." + +He turned away again. He had made his effect, and was content to leave +her to think it over. + +Sally was silent. The significance of his words had not escaped her. She +realized that his presence there was a challenge which she must answer. +And yet it hardly stirred her. She had been fighting so long, and she +felt utterly inert. She was like a swimmer who can battle no longer and +prepares to yield to the numbness of exhaustion. The heat of the room +pressed down on her like a smothering blanket. Her tired nerves cried +out under the blare of music and the clatter of voices. + +"Shall we dance this?" he asked. + +The orchestra had started to play again, a sensuous, creamy melody which +was making the most of its brief reign as Broadway's leading song-hit, +overfamiliar to her from a hundred repetitions. + +"If you like." + +Efficiency was Bruce Carmyle's gospel. He was one of these men who +do not attempt anything which they cannot accomplish to perfection. +Dancing, he had decided early in his life, was a part of a gentleman's +education, and he had seen to it that he was educated thoroughly. Sally, +who, as they swept out on to the floor, had braced herself automatically +for a repetition of the usual bumping struggle which dancing at the +Flower Garden had come to mean for her, found herself in the arms of +a masterful expert, a man who danced better than she did, and suddenly +there came to her a feeling that was almost gratitude, a miraculous +slackening of her taut nerves, a delicious peace. Soothed and contented, +she yielded herself with eyes half closed to the rhythm of the melody, +finding it now robbed in some mysterious manner of all its stale +cheapness, and in that moment her whole attitude towards Bruce Carmyle +underwent a complete change. + +She had never troubled to examine with any minuteness her feelings +towards him: but one thing she had known clearly since their first +meeting--that he was physically distasteful to her. For all his good +looks, and in his rather sinister way he was a handsome man, she had +shrunk from him. Now, spirited away by the magic of the dance, that +repugnance had left her. It was as if some barrier had been broken down +between them. + +"Sally!" + +She felt his arm tighten about her, the muscles quivering. She caught +sight of his face. His dark eyes suddenly blazed into hers and she +stumbled with an odd feeling of helplessness; realizing with a shock +that brought her with a jerk out of the half-dream into which she had +been lulled that this dance had not postponed the moment of decision, +as she had looked to it to do. In a hot whisper, the words swept away +on the flood of the music which had suddenly become raucous and blaring +once more, he was repeating what he had said under the trees at Monk's +Crofton on that far-off morning in the English springtime. Dizzily +she knew that she was resenting the unfairness of the attack at such a +moment, but her mind seemed numbed. + +The music stopped abruptly. Insistent clapping started it again, but +Sally moved away to her table, and he followed her like a shadow. +Neither spoke. Bruce Carmyle had said his say, and Sally was sitting +staring before her, trying to think. She was tired, tired. Her eyes were +burning. She tried to force herself to face the situation squarely. Was +it worth struggling? Was anything in the world worth a struggle? She +only knew that she was tired, desperately tired, tired to the very +depths of her soul. + +The music stopped. There was more clapping, but this time the orchestra +did not respond. Gradually the floor emptied. The shuffling of feet +ceased. The Flower Garden was as quiet as it was ever able to be. Even +the voices of the babblers seemed strangely hushed. Sally closed her +eyes, and as she did so from somewhere up near the roof there came the +song of a bird. + +Isadore Abrahams was a man of his word. He advertised a Flower Garden, +and he had tried to give the public something as closely resembling +a flower-garden as it was possible for an overcrowded, overheated, +overnoisy Broadway dancing-resort to achieve. Paper roses festooned the +walls; genuine tulips bloomed in tubs by every pillar; and from the +roof hung cages with birds in them. One of these, stirred by the sudden +cessation of the tumult below, had began to sing. + +Sally had often pitied these birds, and more than once had pleaded in +vain with Abrahams for a remission of their sentence, but somehow at +this moment it did not occur to her that this one was merely praying in +its own language, as she often had prayed in her thoughts, to be taken +out of this place. To her, sitting there wrestling with Fate, the song +seemed cheerful. It soothed her. It healed her to listen to it. And +suddenly before her eyes there rose a vision of Monk's Crofton, cool, +green, and peaceful under the mild English sun, luring her as an oasis +seen in the distance lures the desert traveller... + +She became aware that the master of Monk's Crofton had placed his hand +on hers and was holding it in a tightening grip. She looked down and +gave a little shiver. She had always disliked Bruce Carmyle's hands. +They were strong and bony and black hair grew on the back of them. One +of the earliest feelings regarding him had been that she would hate to +have those hands touching her. But she did not move. Again that vision +of the old garden had flickered across her mind... a haven where she +could rest... + +He was leaning towards her, whispering in her ear. The room was hotter +than it had ever been, noisier than it had ever been, fuller than it had +ever been. The bird on the roof was singing again and now she understood +what it said. "Take me out of this!" Did anything matter except that? +What did it matter how one was taken, or where, or by whom, so that one +was taken. + +Monk's Crofton was looking cool and green and peaceful... + +"Very well," said Sally. + +3 + + + +Bruce Carmyle, in the capacity of accepted suitor, found himself at +something of a loss. He had a dissatisfied feeling. It was not the +manner of Sally's acceptance that caused this. It would, of course, have +pleased him better if she had shown more warmth, but he was prepared to +wait for warmth. What did trouble him was the fact that his correct mind +perceived now for the first time that he had chosen an unsuitable moment +and place for his outburst of emotion. He belonged to the orthodox +school of thought which looks on moonlight and solitude as the proper +setting for a proposal of marriage; and the surroundings of the Flower +Garden, for all its nice-ness and the nice manner in which it was +conducted, jarred upon him profoundly. + +Music had begun again, but it was not the soft music such as a lover +demands if he is to give of his best. It was a brassy, clashy rendering +of a ribald one-step, enough to choke the eloquence of the most ardent. +Couples were dipping and swaying and bumping into one another as far +as the eye could reach; while just behind him two waiters had halted in +order to thrash out one of those voluble arguments in which waiters +love to indulge. To continue the scene at the proper emotional level +was impossible, and Bruce Carmyle began his career as an engaged man by +dropping into Smalltalk. + +"Deuce of a lot of noise," he said querulously. + +"Yes," agreed Sally. + +"Is it always like this?" + +"Oh, yes." + +"Infernal racket!" + +"Yes." + +The romantic side of Mr. Carmyle's nature could have cried aloud at the +hideous unworthiness of these banalities. In the visions which he had +had of himself as a successful wooer, it had always been in the moments +immediately succeeding the all-important question and its whispered +reply that he had come out particularly strong. He had been accustomed +to picture himself bending with a proud tenderness over his partner in +the scene and murmuring some notably good things to her bowed head. How +could any man murmur in a pandemonium like this. From tenderness Bruce +Carmyle descended with a sharp swoop to irritability. + +"Do you often come here?" + +"Yes." + +"What for?" + +"To dance." + +Mr. Carmyle chafed helplessly. The scene, which should be so romantic, +had suddenly reminded him of the occasion when, at the age of twenty, he +had attended his first ball and had sat in a corner behind a potted palm +perspiring shyly and endeavouring to make conversation to a formidable +nymph in pink. It was one of the few occasions in his life at which he +had ever been at a complete disadvantage. He could still remember the +clammy discomfort of his too high collar as it melted on him. Most +certainly it was not a scene which he enjoyed recalling; and that +he should be forced to recall it now, at what ought to have been the +supreme moment of his life, annoyed him intensely. Almost angrily he +endeavoured to jerk the conversation to a higher level. + +"Darling," he murmured, for by moving his chair two feet to the right +and bending sideways he found that he was in a position to murmur, "you +have made me so..." + +"Batti, batti! I presto ravioli hollandaise," cried one of the disputing +waiters at his back--or to Bruce Carmyle's prejudiced hearing it sounded +like that. + +"La Donna e mobile spaghetti napoli Tettrazina," rejoined the second +waiter with spirit. + +"... you have made me so..." + +"Infanta Isabella lope de Vegas mulligatawny Toronto," said the first +waiter, weak but coming back pluckily. + +"... so happy..." + +"Funiculi funicula Vincente y Blasco Ibanez vermicelli sul campo della +gloria risotto!" said the second waiter clinchingly, and scored a +technical knockout. + +Bruce Carmyle gave it up, and lit a moody cigarette. He was oppressed by +that feeling which so many of us have felt in our time, that it was all +wrong. + +The music stopped. The two leading citizens of Little Italy vanished and +went their way, probably to start a vendetta. There followed comparative +calm. But Bruce Carmyle's emotions, like sweet bells jangled, were out +of tune, and he could not recapture the first fine careless rapture. He +found nothing within him but small-talk. + +"What has become of your party?" he asked. + +"My party?" + +"The people you are with," said Mr. Carmyle. Even in the stress of his +emotion this problem had been exercising him. In his correctly ordered +world girls did not go to restaurants alone. + +"I'm not with anybody." + +"You came here by yourself?" exclaimed Bruce Carmyle, frankly aghast. +And, as he spoke, the wraith of Uncle Donald, banished till now, +returned as large as ever, puffing disapproval through a walrus +moustache. + +"I am employed here," said Sally. + +Mr. Carmyle started violently. + +"Employed here?" + +"As a dancer, you know. I..." + +Sally broke off, her attention abruptly diverted to something which +had just caught her eye at a table on the other side of the room. +That something was a red-headed young man of sturdy build who had just +appeared beside the chair in which Mr. Reginald Cracknell was sitting +in huddled gloom. In one hand he carried a basket, and from this basket, +rising above the din of conversation, there came a sudden sharp yapping. +Mr. Cracknell roused himself from his stupor, took the basket, raised +the lid. The yapping increased in volume. + +Mr. Cracknell rose, the basket in his arms. With uncertain steps and a +look on his face like that of those who lead forlorn hopes he crossed +the floor to where Miss Mabel Hobson sat, proud and aloof. The next +moment that haughty lady, the centre of an admiring and curious +crowd, was hugging to her bosom a protesting Pekingese puppy, and Mr. +Cracknell, seizing his opportunity like a good general, had deposited +himself in a chair at her side. The course of true love was running +smooth again. + +The red-headed young man was gazing fixedly at Sally. + +"As a dancer!" ejaculated Mr. Carmyle. Of all those within sight of the +moving drama which had just taken place, he alone had paid no attention +to it. Replete as it was with human interest, sex-appeal, the punch, and +all the other qualities which a drama should possess, it had failed to +grip him. His thoughts had been elsewhere. The accusing figure of Uncle +Donald refused to vanish from his mental eye. The stern voice of Uncle +Donald seemed still to ring in his ear. + +A dancer! A professional dancer at a Broadway restaurant! Hideous doubts +began to creep like snakes into Bruce Carmyle's mind. What, he asked +himself, did he really know of this girl on whom he had bestowed the +priceless boon of his society for life? How did he know what she was--he +could not find the exact adjective to express his meaning, but he knew +what he meant. Was she worthy of the boon? That was what it amounted +to. All his life he had had a prim shrinking from the section of the +feminine world which is connected with the light-life of large cities. +Club acquaintances of his in London had from time to time married into +the Gaiety Chorus, and Mr. Carmyle, though he had no objection to +the Gaiety Chorus in its proper place--on the other side of the +footlights--had always looked on these young men after as social +outcasts. The fine dashing frenzy which had brought him all the way from +South Audley Street to win Sally was ebbing fast. + +Sally, hearing him speak, had turned. And there was a candid honesty +in her gaze which for a moment sent all those creeping doubts scuttling +away into the darkness whence they had come. He had not made a fool of +himself, he protested to the lowering phantom of Uncle Donald. Who, he +demanded, could look at Sally and think for an instant that she was not +all that was perfect and lovable? A warm revulsion of feeling swept over +Bruce Carmyle like a returning tide. + +"You see, I lost my money and had to do something," said Sally. + +"I see, I see," murmured Mr. Carmyle; and if only Fate had left him +alone who knows to what heights of tenderness he might not have soared? +But at this moment Fate, being no respecter of persons, sent into his +life the disturbing personality of George Washington Williams. + +George Washington Williams was the talented coloured gentleman who +had been extracted from small-time vaudeville by Mr. Abrahams to do +a nightly speciality at the Flower Garden. He was, in fact, a +trap-drummer: and it was his amiable practice, after he had done a few +minutes trap-drumming, to rise from his seat and make a circular tour of +the tables on the edge of the dancing-floor, whimsically pretending +to clip the locks of the male patrons with a pair of drumsticks held +scissor-wise. And so it came about that, just as Mr. Carmyle was bending +towards Sally in an access of manly sentiment, and was on the very verge +of pouring out his soul in a series of well-phrased remarks, he was +surprised and annoyed to find an Ethiopian to whom he had never been +introduced leaning over him and taking quite unpardonable liberties with +his back hair. + +One says that Mr. Carmyle was annoyed. The word is weak. The +interruption coming at such a moment jarred every ganglion in his body. +The clicking noise of the drumsticks maddened him. And the gleaming +whiteness of Mr. Williams' friendly and benignant smile was the last +straw. His dignity writhed beneath this abominable infliction. People +at other tables were laughing. At him. A loathing for the Flower Garden +flowed over Bruce Carmyle, and with it a feeling of suspicion and +disapproval of everyone connected with the establishment. He sprang to +his feet. + +"I think I will be going," he said. + +Sally did not reply. She was watching Ginger, who still stood beside the +table recently vacated by Reginald Cracknell. + +"Good night," said Mr. Carmyle between his teeth. + +"Oh, are you going?" said Sally with a start. She felt embarrassed. Try +as she would, she was unable to find words of any intimacy. She tried to +realize that she had promised to marry this man, but never before had he +seemed so much a stranger to her, so little a part of her life. It came +to her with a sensation of the incredible that she had done this thing, +taken this irrevocable step. + +The sudden sight of Ginger had shaken her. It was as though in the last +half-hour she had forgotten him and only now realized what marriage with +Bruce Carmyle would mean to their comradeship. From now on he was dead +to her. If anything in this world was certain that was. Sally Nicholas +was Ginger's pal, but Mrs. Carmyle, she realized, would never be allowed +to see him again. A devastating feeling of loss smote her like a blow. + +"Yes, I've had enough of this place," Bruce Carmyle was saying. + +"Good night," said Sally. She hesitated. "When shall I see you?" she +asked awkwardly. + +It occurred to Bruce Carmyle that he was not showing himself at his +best. He had, he perceived, allowed his nerves to run away with him. + +"You don't mind if I go?" he said more amiably. "The fact is, I can't +stand this place any longer. I'll tell you one thing, I'm going to take +you out of here quick." + +"I'm afraid I can't leave at a moment's notice," said Sally, loyal to +her obligations. + +"We'll talk over that to-morrow. I'll call for you in the morning and +take you for a drive somewhere in a car. You want some fresh air after +this." Mr. Carmyle looked about him in stiff disgust, and expressed +his unalterable sentiments concerning the Flower Garden, that apple of +Isadore Abrahams' eye, in a snort of loathing. "My God! What a place!" + +He walked quickly away and disappeared. And Ginger, beaming happily, +swooped on Sally's table like a homing pigeon. + + + +4 + + + +"Good Lord, I say, what ho!" cried Ginger. "Fancy meeting you here. What +a bit of luck!" He glanced over his shoulder warily. "Has that blighter +pipped?" + +"Pipped?" + +"Popped," explained Ginger. "I mean to say, he isn't coming back or any +rot like that, is he?" + +"Mr. Carmyle? No, he has gone." + +"Sound egg!" said Ginger with satisfaction. "For a moment, when I saw +you yarning away together, I thought he might be with your party. What +on earth is he doing over here at all, confound him? He's got all Europe +to play about in, why should he come infesting New York? I say, it +really is ripping, seeing you again. It seems years... Of course, one +get's a certain amount of satisfaction writing letters, but it's not the +same. Besides, I write such rotten letters. I say, this really is rather +priceless. Can't I get you something? A cup of coffee, I mean, or an egg +or something? By jove! this really is top-hole." + +His homely, honest face glowed with pleasure, and it seemed to Sally as +though she had come out of a winter's night into a warm friendly room. +Her mercurial spirits soared. + +"Oh, Ginger! If you knew what it's like seeing you!" + +"No, really? Do you mean, honestly, you're braced?" + +"I should say I am braced." + +"Well, isn't that fine! I was afraid you might have forgotten me." + +"Forgotten you!" + +With something of the effect of a revelation it suddenly struck Sally +how far she had been from forgetting him, how large was the place he had +occupied in her thoughts. + +"I've missed you dreadfully," she said, and felt the words inadequate as +she uttered them. + +"What ho!" said Ginger, also internally condemning the poverty of speech +as a vehicle for conveying thought. + +There was a brief silence. The first exhilaration of the reunion over, +Sally deep down in her heart was aware of a troubled feeling as though +the world were out of joint. She forced herself to ignore it, but it +would not be ignored. It grew. Dimly she was beginning to realize what +Ginger meant to her, and she fought to keep herself from realizing it. +Strange things were happening to her to-night, strange emotions stirring +her. Ginger seemed somehow different, as if she were really seeing him +for the first time. + +"You're looking wonderfully well," she said trying to keep the +conversation on a pedestrian level. + +"I am well," said Ginger. "Never felt fitter in my life. Been out in the +open all day long... simple life and all that... working like blazes. +I say, business is booming. Did you see me just now, handing over Percy +the Pup to what's-his-name? Five hundred dollars on that one deal. Got +the cheque in my pocket. But what an extraordinarily rummy thing that +I should have come to this place to deliver the goods just when you +happened to be here. I couldn't believe my eyes at first. I say, I +hope the people you're with won't think I'm butting in. You'll have to +explain that we're old pals and that you started me in business and all +that sort of thing. Look here," he said lowering his voice, "I know +how you hate being thanked, but I simply must say how terrifically +decent..." + +"Miss Nicholas." + +Lee Schoenstein was standing at the table, and by his side an expectant +youth with a small moustache and pince-nez. Sally got up, and the next +moment Ginger was alone, gaping perplexedly after her as she vanished +and reappeared in the jogging throng on the dancing floor. It was the +nearest thing Ginger had seen to a conjuring trick, and at that moment +he was ill-attuned to conjuring tricks. He brooded, fuming, at what +seemed to him the supremest exhibition of pure cheek, of monumental +nerve, and of undiluted crust that had ever come within his notice. To +come and charge into a private conversation like that and whisk her away +without a word... + +"Who was that blighter?" he demanded with heat, when the music ceased +and Sally limped back. + +"That was Mr. Schoenstein." + +"And who was the other?" + +"The one I danced with? I don't know." + +"You don't know?" + +Sally perceived that the conversation had arrived at an embarrassing +point. There was nothing for it but candour. + +"Ginger," she said, "you remember my telling you when we first met that +I used to dance in a Broadway place? This is the place. I'm working +again." + +Complete unintelligence showed itself on Ginger's every feature. + +"I don't understand," he said--unnecessarily, for his face revealed the +fact. + +"I've got my old job back." + +"But why?" + +"Well, I had to do something." She went on rapidly. Already a light +dimly resembling the light of understanding was beginning to appear in +Ginger's eyes. "Fillmore went smash, you know--it wasn't his fault, poor +dear. He had the worst kind of luck--and most of my money was tied up in +his business, so you see..." + +She broke off confused by the look in his eyes, conscious of an absurd +feeling of guilt. There was amazement in that look and a sort of +incredulous horror. + +"Do you mean to say..." Ginger gulped and started again. "Do you mean +to tell me that you let me have... all that money... for the +dog-business... when you were broke? Do you mean to say..." + +Sally stole a glance at his crimson face and looked away again quickly. +There was an electric silence. + +"Look here," exploded Ginger with sudden violence, "you've got to marry +me. You've jolly well got to marry me! I don't mean that," he added +quickly. "I mean to say I know you're going to marry whoever you +please... but won't you marry me? Sally, for God's sake have a dash +at it! I've been keeping it in all this time because it seemed rather +rotten to bother you about it, but now....Oh, dammit, I wish I could put +it into words. I always was rotten at talking. But... well, look here, +what I mean is, I know I'm not much of a chap, but it seems to me you +must care for me a bit to do a thing like that for a fellow... and... +I've loved you like the dickens ever since I met you... I do wish you'd +have a stab at it, Sally. At least I could look after you, you know, +and all that... I mean to say, work like the deuce and try to give you a +good time... I'm not such an ass as to think a girl like you could ever +really... er... love a blighter like me, but..." + +Sally laid her hand on his. + +"Ginger, dear," she said, "I do love you. I ought to have known it all +along, but I seem to be understanding myself to-night for the first +time." She got up and bent over him for a swift moment, whispering in +his ear, "I shall never love anyone but you, Ginger. Will you try +to remember that." She was moving away, but he caught at her arm and +stopped her. + +"Sally..." + +She pulled her arm away, her face working as she fought against the +tears that would not keep back. + +"I've made a fool of myself," she said. "Ginger, your cousin... Mr. +Carmyle... just now he asked me to marry him, and I said I would." + +She was gone, flitting among the tables like some wild creature running +to its home: and Ginger, motionless, watched her go. + + + +5 + + + +The telephone-bell in Sally's little sitting-room was ringing jerkily +as she let herself in at the front door. She guessed who it was at the +other end of the wire, and the noise of the bell sounded to her like the +voice of a friend in distress crying for help. Without stopping to +close the door, she ran to the table and unhooked the receiver. Muffled, +plaintive sounds were coming over the wire. + +"Hullo... Hullo... I say... Hullo..." + +"Hullo, Ginger," said Sally quietly. + +An ejaculation that was half a shout and half gurgle answered her. + +"Sally! Is that you?" + +"Yes, here I am, Ginger." + +"I've been trying to get you for ages." + +"I've only just come in. I walked home." + +There was a pause. + +"Hullo." + +"Yes?" + +"Well, I mean..." Ginger seemed to be finding his usual difficulty in +expressing himself. "About that, you know. What you said." + +"Yes?" said Sally, trying to keep her voice from shaking. + +"You said..." Again Ginger's vocabulary failed him. "You said you loved +me." + +"Yes," said Sally simply. + +Another odd sound floated over the wire, and there was a moment of +silence before Ginger found himself able to resume. + +"I... I... Well, we can talk about that when we meet. I mean, it's no +good trying to say what I think over the 'phone, I'm sort of knocked +out. I never dreamed... But, I say, what did you mean about Bruce?" + +"I told you, I told you." Sally's face was twisted and the receiver +shook in her hand. "I've made a fool of myself. I never realized... And +now it's too late." + +"Good God!" Ginger's voice rose in a sharp wail. "You can't mean you +really... You don't seriously intend to marry the man?" + +"I must. I've promised." + +"But, good heavens..." + +"It's no good. I must." + +"But the man's a blighter!" + +"I can't break my word." + +"I never heard such rot," said Ginger vehemently. "Of course you can. A +girl isn't expected..." + +"I can't, Ginger dear, I really can't." + +"But look here..." + +"It's really no good talking about it any more, really it isn't... Where +are you staying to-night?" + +"Staying? Me? At the Plaza. But look here..." + +Sally found herself laughing weakly. + +"At the Plaza! Oh, Ginger, you really do want somebody to look after +you. Squandering your pennies like that... Well, don't talk any more +now. It's so late and I'm so tired. I'll come and see you to-morrow. +Good night." + +She hung up the receiver quickly, to cut short a fresh outburst of +protest. And as she turned away a voice spoke behind her. + +"Sally!" + +Gerald Foster was standing in the doorway. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII. SALLY LAYS A GHOST + + + +1 + + + +The blood flowed slowly back into Sally's face, and her heart, which +had leaped madly for an instant at the sound of his voice, resumed its +normal beat. The suddenness of the shock over, she was surprised to +find herself perfectly calm. Always when she had imagined this meeting, +knowing that it would have to take place sooner or later, she had felt +something akin to panic: but now that it had actually occurred it hardly +seemed to stir her. The events of the night had left her incapable of +any violent emotion. + +"Hullo, Sally!" said Gerald. + +He spoke thickly, and there was a foolish smile on his face as he +stood swaying with one hand on the door. He was in his shirt-sleeves, +collarless: and it was plain that he had been drinking heavily. His face +was white and puffy, and about him there hung like a nimbus a sodden +disreputableness. + +Sally did not speak. Weighed down before by a numbing exhaustion, she +seemed now to have passed into that second phase in which over-tired +nerves enter upon a sort of Indian summer of abnormal alertness. She +looked at him quietly, coolly and altogether dispassionately, as if he +had been a stranger. + +"Hullo!" said Gerald again. + +"What do you want?" said Sally. + +"Heard your voice. Saw the door open. Thought I'd come in." + +"What do you want?" + +The weak smile which had seemed pinned on Gerald's face vanished. A tear +rolled down his cheek. His intoxication had reached the maudlin stage. + +"Sally... S-Sally... I'm very miserable." He slurred awkwardly over the +difficult syllables. "Heard your voice. Saw the door open. Thought I'd +come in." + +Something flicked at the back of Sally's mind. She seemed to have +been through all this before. Then she remembered. This was simply Mr. +Reginald Cracknell over again. + +"I think you had better go to bed, Gerald," she said steadily. Nothing +about him seemed to touch her now, neither the sight of him nor his +shameless misery. + +"What's the use? Can't sleep. No good. Couldn't sleep. Sally, you don't +know how worried I am. I see what a fool I've been." + +Sally made a quick gesture, to check what she supposed was about +to develop into a belated expression of regret for his treatment of +herself. She did not want to stand there listening to Gerald apologizing +with tears for having done his best to wreck her life. But it seemed +that it was not this that was weighing upon his soul. + +"I was a fool ever to try writing plays," he went on. "Got a winner +first time, but can't repeat. It's no good. Ought to have stuck to +newspaper work. I'm good at that. Shall have to go back to it. Had +another frost to-night. No good trying any more. Shall have to go back +to the old grind, damn it." + +He wept softly, full of pity for his hard case. + +"Very miserable," he murmured. + +He came forward a step into the room, lurched, and retreated to the safe +support of the door. For an instant Sally's artificial calm was shot +through by a swift stab of contempt. It passed, and she was back again +in her armour of indifference. + +"Go to bed, Gerald," she said. "You'll feel better in the morning." + +Perhaps some inkling of how he was going to feel in the morning worked +through to Gerald's muddled intelligence, for he winced, and his manner +took on a deeper melancholy. + +"May not be alive in the morning," he said solemnly. "Good mind to +end it all. End it all!" he repeated with the beginning of a sweeping +gesture which was cut off abruptly as he clutched at the friendly door. + +Sally was not in the mood for melodrama. + +"Oh, go to bed," she said impatiently. The strange frozen indifference +which had gripped her was beginning to pass, leaving in its place a +growing feeling of resentment--resentment against Gerald for degrading +himself like this, against herself for ever having found glamour in the +man. It humiliated her to remember how utterly she had once allowed his +personality to master hers. And under the sting of this humiliation she +felt hard and pitiless. Dimly she was aware that a curious change had +come over her to-night. Normally, the sight of any living thing in +distress was enough to stir her quick sympathy: but Gerald mourning +over the prospect of having to go back to regular work made no appeal to +her--a fact which the sufferer noted and commented upon. + +"You're very unsymp... unsympathetic," he complained. + +"I'm sorry," said Sally. She walked briskly to the door and gave it a +push. Gerald, still clinging to his chosen support, moved out into the +passage, attached to the handle, with the air of a man the foundations +of whose world have suddenly lost their stability. He released the +handle and moved uncertainly across the passage. Finding his own door +open before him, he staggered over the threshold; and Sally, having +watched him safely to his journey's end, went into her bedroom with the +intention of terminating this disturbing night by going to sleep. + +Almost immediately she changed her mind. Sleep was out of the question. +A fever of restlessness had come upon her. She put on a kimono, and +went into the kitchen to ascertain whether her commissariat arrangements +would permit of a glass of hot milk. + +She had just remembered that she had that morning presented the last +of the milk to a sandy cat with a purposeful eye which had dropped in +through the window to take breakfast with her, when her regrets for this +thriftless hospitality were interrupted by a muffled crash. + +She listened intently. The sound had seemed to come from across the +passage. She hurried to the door and opened it. As she did so, from +behind the door of the apartment opposite there came a perfect fusillade +of crashes, each seeming to her strained hearing louder and more +appalling than the last. + +There is something about sudden, loud noises in the stillness of the +night which shatters the most rigid detachment. A short while before, +Gerald, toying with the idea of ending his sorrows by violence, had +left Sally unmoved: but now her mind leapt back to what he had said, +and apprehension succeeded indifference. There was no disputing the fact +that Gerald was in an irresponsible mood, under the influence of +which he was capable of doing almost anything. Sally, listening in the +doorway, felt a momentary panic. + +A brief silence had succeeded the fusillade, but, as she stood there +hesitating, the noise broke out again; and this time it was so loud and +compelling that Sally hesitated no longer. She ran across the passage +and beat on the door. + + + +2 + + + +Whatever devastating happenings had been going on in his home, it was +plain a moment later that Gerald had managed to survive them: for there +came the sound of a dragging footstep, and the door opened. Gerald stood +on the threshold, the weak smile back on his face. + +"Hullo, Sally!" + +At the sight of him, disreputable and obviously unscathed, Sally's +brief alarm died away, leaving in its place the old feeling of impatient +resentment. In addition to her other grievances against him, he had +apparently frightened her unnecessarily. + +"Whatever was all that noise?" she demanded. + +"Noise?" said Gerald, considering the point open-mouthed. + +"Yes, noise," snapped Sally. + +"I've been cleaning house," said Gerald with the owl-like gravity of a +man just conscious that he is not wholly himself. + +Sally pushed her way past him. The apartment in which she found herself +was almost an exact replica of her own, and it was evident that Elsa +Doland had taken pains to make it pretty and comfortable in a niggly +feminine way. Amateur interior decoration had always been a hobby +of hers. Even in the unpromising surroundings of her bedroom at +Mrs. Meecher's boarding-house she had contrived to create a certain +daintiness which Sally, who had no ability in that direction herself, +had always rather envied. As a decorator Elsa's mind ran in the +direction of small, fragile ornaments, and she was not afraid of +over-furnishing. Pictures jostled one another on the walls: china of all +description stood about on little tables: there was a profusion of lamps +with shades of parti-coloured glass: and plates were ranged along a +series of shelves. + +One says that the plates were ranged and the pictures jostled one +another, but it would be more correct to put it they had jostled and +had been ranged, for it was only by guess-work that Sally was able +to reconstruct the scene as it must have appeared before Gerald had +started, as he put it, to clean house. She had walked into the flat +briskly enough, but she pulled up short as she crossed the threshold, +appalled by the majestic ruin that met her gaze. A shell bursting in the +little sitting-room could hardly have created more havoc. + +The psychology of a man of weak character under the influence of alcohol +and disappointed ambition is not easy to plumb, for his moods follow one +another with a rapidity which baffles the observer. Ten minutes before, +Gerald Foster had been in the grip of a clammy self-pity, and it seemed +from his aspect at the present moment that this phase had returned. But +in the interval there had manifestly occurred a brief but adequate +spasm of what would appear to have been an almost Berserk fury. What had +caused it and why it should have expended itself so abruptly, Sally was +not psychologist enough to explain; but that it had existed there was +ocular evidence of the most convincing kind. A heavy niblick, flung +petulantly--or remorsefully--into a corner, showed by what medium the +destruction had been accomplished. + +Bleak chaos appeared on every side. The floor was littered with every +imaginable shape and size of broken glass and china. Fragments of +pictures, looking as if they had been chewed by some prehistoric animal, +lay amid heaps of shattered statuettes and vases. As Sally moved slowly +into the room after her involuntary pause, china crackled beneath her +feet. She surveyed the stripped walls with a wondering eye, and turned +to Gerald for an explanation. + +Gerald had subsided on to an occasional table, and was weeping softly +again. It had come over him once more that he had been very, very badly +treated. + +"Well!" said Sally with a gasp. "You've certainly made a good job of +it!" + +There was a sharp crack as the occasional table, never designed by its +maker to bear heavy weights, gave way in a splintering flurry of broken +legs under the pressure of the master of the house: and Sally's mood +underwent an abrupt change. There are few situations in life which do +not hold equal potentialities for both tragedy and farce, and it was +the ludicrous side of this drama that chanced to appeal to Sally at +this moment. Her sense of humour was tickled. It was, if she could have +analysed her feelings, at herself that she was mocking--at the feeble +sentimental Sally who had once conceived the absurd idea of taking this +preposterous man seriously. She felt light-hearted and light-headed, and +she sank into a chair with a gurgling laugh. + +The shock of his fall appeared to have had the desirable effect of +restoring Gerald to something approaching intelligence. He picked +himself up from the remains of a set of water-colours, gazing at Sally +with growing disapproval. + +"No sympathy," he said austerely. + +"I can't help it," cried Sally. "It's too funny." + +"Not funny," corrected Gerald, his brain beginning to cloud once more. + +"What did you do it for?" + +Gerald returned for a moment to that mood of honest indignation, which +had so strengthened his arm when wielding the niblick. He bethought him +once again of his grievance. + +"Wasn't going to stand for it any longer," he said heatedly. "A fellow's +wife goes and lets him down... ruins his show by going off and playing +in another show... why shouldn't I smash her things? Why should I stand +for that sort of treatment? Why should I?" + +"Well, you haven't," said Sally, "so there's no need to discuss it. You +seem to have acted in a thoroughly manly and independent way." + +"That's it. Manly independent." He waggled his finger impressively. +"Don't care what she says," he continued. "Don't care if she never comes +back. That woman..." + +Sally was not prepared to embark with him upon a discussion of the +absent Elsa. Already the amusing aspect of the affair had begun to fade, +and her hilarity was giving way to a tired distaste for the sordidness +of the whole business. She had become aware that she could not +endure the society of Gerald Foster much longer. She got up and spoke +decidedly. + +"And now," she said, "I'm going to tidy up." + +Gerald had other views. + +"No," he said with sudden solemnity. "No! Nothing of the kind. Leave it +for her to find. Leave it as it is." + +"Don't be silly. All this has got to be cleaned up. I'll do it. You go +and sit in my apartment. I'll come and tell you when you can come back." + +"No!" said Gerald, wagging his head. + +Sally stamped her foot among the crackling ruins. Quite suddenly the +sight of him had become intolerable. + +"Do as I tell you," she cried. + +Gerald wavered for a moment, but his brief militant mood was ebbing +fast. After a faint protest he shuffled off, and Sally heard him go into +her room. She breathed a deep breath of relief and turned to her task. + +A visit to the kitchen revealed a long-handled broom, and, armed with +this, Sally was soon busy. She was an efficient little person, and +presently out of chaos there began to emerge a certain order. Nothing +short of complete re-decoration would ever make the place look habitable +again, but at the end of half an hour she had cleared the floor, and +the fragments of vases, plates, lamp-shades, pictures and glasses were +stacked in tiny heaps against the walls. She returned the broom to the +kitchen, and, going back into the sitting-room, flung open the window +and stood looking out. + +With a sense of unreality she perceived that the night had gone. Over +the quiet street below there brooded that strange, metallic light which +ushers in the dawn of a fine day. A cold breeze whispered to and fro. +Above the house-tops the sky was a faint, level blue. + +She left the window and started to cross the room. And suddenly there +came over her a feeling of utter weakness. She stumbled to a chair, +conscious only of being tired beyond the possibility of a further +effort. Her eyes closed, and almost before her head had touched the +cushions she was asleep. + + + +3 + + + +Sally woke. Sunshine was streaming through the open window, and with +it the myriad noises of a city awake and about its business. Footsteps +clattered on the sidewalk, automobile horns were sounding, and she could +hear the clank of street cars as they passed over the points. She could +only guess at the hour, but it was evident that the morning was well +advanced. She got up stiffly. Her head was aching. + +She went into the bathroom, bathed her face, and felt better. The dull +oppression which comes of a bad night was leaving her. She leaned out +of the window, revelling in the fresh air, then crossed the passage and +entered her own apartment. Stertorous breathing greeted her, and she +perceived that Gerald Foster had also passed the night in a chair. He +was sprawling by the window with his legs stretched out and his head +resting on one of the arms, an unlovely spectacle. + +Sally stood regarding him for a moment with a return of the distaste +which she had felt on the previous night. And yet, mingled with the +distaste, there was a certain elation. A black chapter of her life was +closed for ever. Whatever the years to come might bring to her, they +would be free from any wistful yearnings for the man who had once been +woven so inextricably into the fabric of her life. She had thought that +his personality had gripped her too strongly ever to be dislodged, +but now she could look at him calmly and feel only a faint half-pity, +half-contempt. The glamour had departed. + +She shook him gently, and he sat up with a start, blinking in the strong +light. His mouth was still open. He stared at Sally foolishly, then +scrambled awkwardly out of the chair. + +"Oh, my God!" said Gerald, pressing both his hands to his forehead and +sitting down again. He licked his lips with a dry tongue and moaned. +"Oh, I've got a headache!" + +Sally might have pointed out to him that he had certainly earned one, +but she refrained. + +"You'd better go and have a wash," she suggested. + +"Yes," said Gerald, heaving himself up again. + +"Would you like some breakfast?" + +"Don't!" said Gerald faintly, and tottered off to the bathroom. + +Sally sat down in the chair he had vacated. She had never felt quite +like this before in her life. Everything seemed dreamlike. The splashing +of water in the bathroom came faintly to her, and she realized that she +had been on the point of falling asleep again. She got up and opened the +window, and once more the air acted as a restorative. She watched the +activities of the street with a distant interest. They, too, seemed +dreamlike and unreal. People were hurrying up and down on mysterious +errands. An inscrutable cat picked its way daintily across the road. At +the door of the apartment house an open car purred sleepily. + +She was roused by a ring at the bell. She went to the door and opened +it, and found Bruce Carmyle standing on the threshold. He wore a light +motor-coat, and he was plainly endeavouring to soften the severity of +his saturnine face with a smile of beaming kindliness. + +"Well, here I am!" said Bruce Carmyle cheerily. "Are you ready?" + +With the coming of daylight a certain penitence had descended on Mr. +Carmyle. Thinking things over while shaving and subsequently in his +bath, he had come to the conclusion that his behaviour overnight had not +been all that could have been desired. He had not actually been brutal, +perhaps, but he had undoubtedly not been winning. There had been an +abruptness in the manner of his leaving Sally at the Flower Garden which +a perfect lover ought not to have shown. He had allowed his nerves +to get the better of him, and now he desired to make amends. Hence a +cheerfulness which he did not usually exhibit so early in the morning. + +Sally was staring at him blankly. She had completely forgotten that he +had said that he would come and take her for a drive this morning. She +searched in her mind for words, and found none. And, as Mr. Carmyle +was debating within himself whether to kiss her now or wait for a more +suitable moment, embarrassment came upon them both like a fog, and the +genial smile faded from his face as if the motive-power behind it had +suddenly failed. + +"I've--er--got the car outside, and..." + +At this point speech failed Mr. Carmyle, for, even as he began the +sentence, the door that led to the bathroom opened and Gerald Foster +came out. Mr. Carmyle gaped at Gerald: Gerald gaped at Mr. Carmyle. + +The application of cold water to the face and head is an excellent thing +on the morning after an imprudent night, but as a tonic it only goes +part of the way. In the case of Gerald Foster, which was an extremely +serious and aggravated case, it had gone hardly any way at all. The +person unknown who had been driving red-hot rivets into the base of +Gerald Foster's skull ever since the moment of his awakening was still +busily engaged on that task. He gazed at Mr. Carmyle wanly. + +Bruce Carmyle drew in his breath with a sharp hiss, and stood rigid. His +eyes, burning now with a grim light, flickered over Gerald's person +and found nothing in it to entertain them. He saw a slouching figure +in shirt-sleeves and the foundations of evening dress, a disgusting, +degraded figure with pink eyes and a white face that needed a shave. And +all the doubts that had ever come to vex Mr. Carmyle's mind since his +first meeting with Sally became on the instant certainties. So Uncle +Donald had been right after all! This was the sort of girl she was! + +At his elbow the stout phantom of Uncle Donald puffed with satisfaction. + +"I told you so!" it said. + +Sally had not moved. The situation was beyond her. Just as if this had +really been the dream it seemed, she felt incapable of speech or action. + +"So..." said Mr. Carmyle, becoming articulate, and allowed an impressive +aposiopesis to take the place of the rest of the speech. A cold fury +had gripped him. He pointed at Gerald, began to speak, found that he was +stuttering, and gulped back the words. In this supreme moment he was not +going to have his dignity impaired by a stutter. He gulped and found a +sentence which, while brief enough to insure against this disaster, was +sufficiently long to express his meaning. + +"Get out!" he said. + +Gerald Foster had his dignity, too, and it seemed to him that the time +had come to assert it. But he also had a most excruciating headache, and +when he drew himself up haughtily to ask Mr. Carmyle what the devil he +meant by it, a severe access of pain sent him huddling back immediately +to a safer attitude. He clasped his forehead and groaned. + +"Get out!" + +For a moment Gerald hesitated. Then another sudden shooting spasm +convinced him that no profit or pleasure was to be derived from a +continuance of the argument, and he began to shamble slowly across to +the door. Bruce Carmyle watched him go with twitching hands. There was +a moment when the human man in him, somewhat atrophied from long disuse, +stirred him almost to the point of assault; then dignity whispered more +prudent counsel in his ear, and Gerald was past the danger-zone and out +in the passage. Mr. Carmyle turned to face Sally, as King Arthur on +a similar but less impressive occasion must have turned to deal with +Guinevere. + +"So..." he said again. + +Sally was eyeing him steadily--considering the circumstances, Mr. +Carmyle thought with not a little indignation, much too steadily. + +"This," he said ponderously, "is very amusing." + +He waited for her to speak, but she said nothing. + +"I might have expected it," said Mr. Carmyle with a bitter laugh. + +Sally forced herself from the lethargy which was gripping her. + +"Would you like me to explain?" she said. + +"There can be no explanation," said Mr. Carmyle coldly. + +"Very well," said Sally. + +There was a pause. + +"Good-bye," said Bruce Carmyle. + +"Good-bye," said Sally. + +Mr. Carmyle walked to the door. There he stopped for an instant and +glanced back at her. Sally had walked to the window and was looking out. +For one swift instant something about her trim little figure and the +gleam of her hair where the sunlight shone on it seemed to catch at +Bruce Carmyle's heart, and he wavered. But the next moment he was strong +again, and the door had closed behind him with a resolute bang. + +Out in the street, climbing into his car, he looked up involuntarily +to see if she was still there, but she had gone. As the car, gathering +speed, hummed down the street. Sally was at the telephone listening to +the sleepy voice of Ginger Kemp, which, as he became aware who it +was that had woken him from his rest and what she had to say to him, +magically lost its sleepiness and took on a note of riotous ecstasy. + +Five minutes later, Ginger was splashing in his bath, singing +discordantly. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII. JOURNEY'S END + + + +Darkness was beginning to gather slowly and with almost an apologetic +air, as if it regretted the painful duty of putting an end to the +perfect summer day. Over to the west beyond the trees there still +lingered a faint afterglow, and a new moon shone like a silver sickle +above the big barn. Sally came out of the house and bowed gravely three +times for luck. She stood on the gravel, outside the porch, drinking in +the sweet evening scents, and found life good. + +The darkness, having shown a certain reluctance at the start, was now +buckling down to make a quick and thorough job of it. The sky turned +to a uniform dark blue, picked out with quiet stars. The cement of the +state road which led to Patchogue, Babylon, and other important centres +ceased to be a pale blur and became invisible. Lights appeared in the +windows of the houses across the meadows. From the direction of the +kennels there came a single sleepy bark, and the small white woolly dog +which had scampered out at Sally's heels stopped short and uttered a +challenging squeak. + +The evening was so still that Ginger's footsteps, as he pounded along +the road on his way back from the village, whither he had gone to buy +provisions, evening papers, and wool for the sweater which Sally was +knitting, were audible long before he turned in at the gate. Sally could +not see him, but she looked in the direction of the sound and once again +felt that pleasant, cosy thrill of happiness which had come to her every +evening for the last year. + +"Ginger," she called. + +"What ho!" + +The woolly dog, with another important squeak, scuttled down the drive +to look into the matter, and was coldly greeted. Ginger, for all his +love of dogs, had never been able to bring himself to regard Toto with +affection. He had protested when Sally, a month before, finding Mrs. +Meecher distraught on account of a dreadful lethargy which had seized +her pet, had begged him to offer hospitality and country air to the +invalid. + +"It's wonderful what you've done for Toto, angel," said Sally, as he +came up frigidly eluding that curious animal's leaps of welcome. "He's a +different dog." + +"Bit of luck for him," said Ginger. + +"In all the years I was at Mrs. Meecher's I never knew him move at +anything more rapid than a stately walk. Now he runs about all the +time." + +"The blighter had been overeating from birth," said Ginger. "That was +all that was wrong with him. A little judicious dieting put him right. +We'll be able," said Ginger brightening, "to ship him back next week." + +"I shall quite miss him." + +"I nearly missed him--this morning--with a shoe," said Ginger. "He was +up on the kitchen table wolfing the bacon, and I took steps." + +"My cave-man!" murmured Sally. "I always said you had a frightfully +brutal streak in you. Ginger, what an evening!" + +"Good Lord!" said Ginger suddenly, as they walked into the light of the +open kitchen door. + +"Now what?" + +He stopped and eyed her intently. + +"Do you know you're looking prettier than you were when I started down +to the village!" + +Sally gave his arm a little hug. + +"Beloved!" she said. "Did you get the chops?" + +Ginger froze in his tracks, horrified. + +"Oh, my aunt! I clean forgot them!" + +"Oh, Ginger, you are an old chump. Well, you'll have to go in for a +little judicious dieting, like Toto." + +"I say, I'm most awfully sorry. I got the wool." + +"If you think I'm going to eat wool..." + +"Isn't there anything in the house?" + +"Vegetables and fruit." + +"Fine! But, of course, if you want chops..." + +"Not at all. I'm spiritual. Besides, people say that vegetables are good +for the blood-pressure or something. Of course you forgot to get the +mail, too?" + +"Absolutely not! I was on to it like a knife. Two letters from fellows +wanting Airedale puppies." + +"No! Ginger, we are getting on!" + +"Pretty bloated," agreed Ginger complacently. "Pretty bloated. We'll be +able to get that two-seater if things go buzzing on like this. There was +a letter for you. Here it is." + +"It's from Fillmore," said Sally, examining the envelope as they went +into the kitchen. "And about time, too. I haven't had a word from him +for months." + +She sat down and opened the letter. Ginger, heaving himself on to the +table, wriggled into a position of comfort and started to read his +evening paper. But after he had skimmed over the sporting page he +lowered it and allowed his gaze to rest on Sally's bent head with a +feeling of utter contentment. + +Although a married man of nearly a year's standing, Ginger was still +moving about a magic world in a state of dazed incredulity, unable fully +to realize that such bliss could be. Ginger in his time had seen many +things that looked good from a distance, but not one that had borne the +test of a closer acquaintance--except this business of marriage. + +Marriage, with Sally for a partner, seemed to be one of the very few +things in the world in which there was no catch. His honest eyes glowed +as he watched her. Sally broke into a little splutter of laughter. + +"Ginger, look at this!" + +He reached down and took the slip of paper which she held out to him. +The following legend met his eye, printed in bold letters: + + POPP'S + + OUTSTANDING + + SUCCULENT----APPETIZING----NUTRITIOUS. + + + + (JUST SAY "POP!" A CHILD + + CAN DO IT.) + + + +Ginger regarded this cipher with a puzzled frown. + +"What is it?" he asked. + +"It's Fillmore." + +"How do you mean?" + +Sally gurgled. + +"Fillmore and Gladys have started a little restaurant in Pittsburg." + +"A restaurant!" There was a shocked note in Ginger's voice. Although +he knew that the managerial career of that modern Napoleon, his +brother-in-law, had terminated in something of a smash, he had +never quite lost his reverence for one whom he considered a bit of a +master-mind. That Fillmore Nicholas, the Man of Destiny, should have +descended to conducting a restaurant--and a little restaurant at +that--struck him as almost indecent. + +Sally, on the other hand--for sisters always seem to fail in proper +reverence for the greatness of their brothers--was delighted. + +"It's the most splendid idea," she said with enthusiasm. "It really does +look as if Fillmore was going to amount to something at last. Apparently +they started on quite a small scale, just making pork-pies..." + +"Why Popp?" interrupted Ginger, ventilating a question which was +perplexing him deeply. + +"Just a trade name, silly. Gladys is a wonderful cook, you know, and she +made the pies and Fillmore toddled round selling them. And they did +so well that now they've started a regular restaurant, and that's a +success, too. Listen to this." Sally gurgled again and turned over the +letter. "Where is it? Oh yes! '... sound financial footing. In fact, our +success has been so instantaneous that I have decided to launch out on +a really big scale. It is Big Ideas that lead to Big Business. I am +contemplating a vast extension of this venture of ours, and in a very +short time I shall organize branches in New York, Chicago, Detroit, and +all the big cities, each in charge of a manager and each offering as +a special feature, in addition to the usual restaurant cuisine, these +Popp's Outstanding Pork-pies of ours. That done, and having established +all these branches as going concerns, I shall sail for England and +introduce Popp's Pork-pies there...' Isn't he a little wonder!" + +"Dashed brainy chap. Always said so." + +"I must say I was rather uneasy when I read that. I've seen so many of +Fillmore's Big Ideas. That's always the way with him. He gets something +good and then goes and overdoes it and bursts. However, it's all right +now that he's got Gladys to look after him. She has added a postscript. +Just four words, but oh! how comforting to a sister's heart. 'Yes, I +don't think!' is what she says, and I don't know when I've read anything +more cheering. Thank heaven, she's got poor dear Fillmore well in hand." + +"Pork-pies!" said Ginger, musingly, as the pangs of a healthy +hunger began to assail his interior. "I wish he'd sent us one of the +outstanding little chaps. I could do with it." + +Sally got up and ruffled his red hair. + +"Poor old Ginger! I knew you'd never be able to stick it. Come on, it's +a lovely night, let's walk to the village and revel at the inn. We're +going to be millionaires before we know where we are, so we can afford +it." + + +THE END + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Adventures of Sally, by P. G. 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Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: The Adventures of Sally + +Author: P. G. Wodehouse + +Release Date: February, 2005 [EBook #7464] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on May 4, 2003] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII, with a few ISO-8859-1 characters + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ADVENTURES OF SALLY *** + + + + +Produced by Tim Barnett + + + + + + + +CHAPTER I + + + +SALLY GIVES A PARTY + + + +1 + +Sally looked contentedly down the long table. She felt happy at last. +Everybody was talking and laughing now, and her party, rallying after an +uncertain start, was plainly the success she had hoped it would be. The +first atmosphere of uncomfortable restraint, caused, she was only too +well aware, by her brother Fillmore's white evening waistcoat, had worn +off; and the male and female patrons of Mrs. Meecher's select +boarding-house (transient and residential) were themselves again. + +At her end of the table the conversation had turned once more to the +great vital topic of Sally's legacy and what she ought to do with it. +The next best thing to having money of one's own, is to dictate the +spending of somebody else's, and Sally's guests were finding a good deal +of satisfaction in arranging a Budget for her. Rumour having put the sum +at their disposal at a high figure, their suggestions had certain +spaciousness. + +"Let me tell you," said Augustus Bartlett, briskly, "what I'd do, if I +were you." Augustus Bartlett, who occupied an intensely subordinate +position in the firm of Kahn, Morris and Brown, the Wall Street brokers, +always affected a brisk, incisive style of speech, as befitted a man in +close touch with the great ones of Finance. "I'd sink a couple of +hundred thousand in some good, safe bond-issue--we've just put one out +which you would do well to consider--and play about with the rest. When +I say play about, I mean have a flutter in anything good that crops up. +Multiple Steel's worth looking at. They tell me it'll be up to a hundred +and fifty before next Saturday." + +Elsa Doland, the pretty girl with the big eyes who sat on Mr. Bartlett's +left, had other views. + +"Buy a theatre. Sally, and put on good stuff." + +"And lose every bean you've got," said a mild young man, with a deep +voice across the table. "If I had a few hundred thousand," said the mild +young man, "I'd put every cent of it on Benny Whistler for the +heavyweight championship. I've private information that Battling Tuke +has been got at and means to lie down in the seventh..." + +"Say, listen," interrupted another voice, "lemme tell you what I'd do +with four hundred thousand..." + +"If I had four hundred thousand," said Elsa Doland, "I know what would +be the first thing I'd do." + +"What's that?" asked Sally. + +"Pay my bill for last week, due this morning." + +Sally got up quickly, and flitting down the table, put her arm round her +friend's shoulder and whispered in her ear: + +"Elsa darling, are you really broke? If you are, you know, I'll..." + +Elsa Doland laughed. + +"You're an angel, Sally. There's no one like you. You'd give your last +cent to anyone. Of course I'm not broke. I've just come back from the +road, and I've saved a fortune. I only said that to draw you." + +Sally returned to her seat, relieved, and found that the company had now +divided itself into two schools of thought. The conservative and prudent +element, led by Augustus Bartlett, had definitely decided on three +hundred thousand in Liberty Bonds and the rest in some safe real estate; +while the smaller, more sporting section, impressed by the mild young +man's inside information, had already placed Sally's money on Benny +Whistler, doling it out cautiously in small sums so as not to spoil the +market. And so solid, it seemed, was Mr. Tuke's reputation with those in +the inner circle of knowledge that the mild young man was confident +that, if you went about the matter cannily and without precipitation, +three to one might be obtained. It seemed to Sally that the time had +come to correct certain misapprehensions. + +"I don't know where you get your figures," she said, "but I'm afraid +they're wrong. I've just twenty-five thousand dollars." + +The statement had a chilling effect. To these jugglers with +half-millions the amount mentioned seemed for the moment almost too +small to bother about. It was the sort of sum which they had been +mentally setting aside for the heiress's car fare. Then they managed to +adjust their minds to it. After all, one could do something even with a +pittance like twenty-five thousand. + +"If I'd twenty-five thousand," said Augustus Bartlett, the first to +rally from the shock, "I'd buy Amalgamated..." + +"If I had twenty-five thousand..." began Elsa Doland. + +"If I'd had twenty-five thousand in the year nineteen hundred," observed +a gloomy-looking man with spectacles, "I could have started a revolution +in Paraguay." + +He brooded sombrely on what might have been. + +"Well, I'll tell you exactly what I'm going to do," said Sally. "I'm +going to start with a trip to Europe... France, specially. I've heard +France well spoken of--as soon as I can get my passport; and after I've +loafed there for a few weeks, I'm coming back to look about and find +some nice cosy little business which will let me put money into it and +keep me in luxury. Are there any complaints?" + +"Even a couple of thousand on Benny Whistler..." said the mild young man. + +"I don't want your Benny Whistler," said Sally. "I wouldn't have him if +you gave him to me. If I want to lose money, I'll go to Monte Carlo and +do it properly." + +"Monte Carlo," said the gloomy man, brightening up at the magic name. +"I was in Monte Carlo in the year '97, and if I'd had another fifty +dollars... just fifty... I'd have..." + +At the far end of the table there was a stir, a cough, and the grating +of a chair on the floor; and slowly, with that easy grace which actors +of the old school learned in the days when acting was acting, Mr. +Maxwell Faucitt, the boarding-house's oldest inhabitant, rose to his +feet. + +"Ladies," said Mr. Faucitt, bowing courteously, "and..." ceasing to bow +and casting from beneath his white and venerable eyebrows a quelling +glance at certain male members of the boarding-house's younger set who +were showing a disposition towards restiveness, "... gentlemen. I feel +that I cannot allow this occasion to pass without saying a few words." + +His audience did not seem surprised. It was possible that life, always +prolific of incident in a great city like New York, might some day +produce an occasion which Mr. Faucitt would feel that he could allow to +pass without saying a few words; but nothing of the sort had happened as +yet, and they had given up hope. Right from the start of the meal they +had felt that it would be optimism run mad to expect the old gentleman +to abstain from speech on the night of Sally Nicholas' farewell dinner +party; and partly because they had braced themselves to it, but +principally because Miss Nicholas' hospitality had left them with a +genial feeling of repletion, they settled themselves to listen with +something resembling equanimity. A movement on the part of the +Marvellous Murphys--new arrivals, who had been playing the Bushwick +with their equilibristic act during the preceding week--to form a party +of the extreme left and heckle the speaker, broke down under a cold look +from their hostess. Brief though their acquaintance had been, both of +these lissom young gentlemen admired Sally immensely. + +And it should be set on record that this admiration of theirs was not +misplaced. He would have been hard to please who had not been attracted +by Sally. She was a small, trim, wisp of a girl with the tiniest hands +and feet, the friendliest of smiles, and a dimple that came and went in +the curve of her rounded chin. Her eyes, which disappeared when she +laughed, which was often, were a bright hazel; her hair a soft mass of +brown. She had, moreover, a manner, an air of distinction lacking in the +majority of Mrs. Meecher's guests. And she carried youth like a banner. +In approving of Sally, the Marvellous Murphys had been guilty of no +lapse from their high critical standard. + +"I have been asked," proceeded Mr. Faucitt, "though I am aware that +there are others here far worthier of such a task--Brutuses compared +with whom I, like Marc Antony, am no orator--I have been asked to +propose the health..." + +"Who asked you?" It was the smaller of the Marvellous Murphys who spoke. +He was an unpleasant youth, snub-nosed and spotty. Still, he could +balance himself with one hand on an inverted ginger-ale bottle while +revolving a barrel on the soles of his feet. There is good in all of us. + +"I have been asked," repeated Mr. Faucitt, ignoring the unmannerly +interruption, which, indeed, he would have found it hard to answer, "to +propose the health of our charming hostess (applause), coupled with +the name of her brother, our old friend Fillmore Nicholas." + +The gentleman referred to, who sat at the speaker's end of the table, +acknowledged the tribute with a brief nod of the head. It was a nod of +condescension; the nod of one who, conscious of being hedged about by +social inferiors, nevertheless does his best to be not unkindly. And +Sally, seeing it, debated in her mind for an instant the advisability of +throwing an orange at her brother. There was one lying ready to her +hand, and his glistening shirt-front offered an admirable mark; but she +restrained herself. After all, if a hostess yields to her primitive +impulses, what happens? Chaos. She had just frowned down the exuberance +of the rebellious Murphys, and she felt that if, even with the highest +motives, she began throwing fruit, her influence for good in that +quarter would be weakened. + +She leaned back with a sigh. The temptation had been hard to resist. A +democratic girl, pomposity was a quality which she thoroughly disliked; +and though she loved him, she could not disguise from herself that, ever +since affluence had descended upon him some months ago, her brother +Fillmore had become insufferably pompous. If there are any young men +whom inherited wealth improves, Fillmore Nicholas was not one of them. +He seemed to regard himself nowadays as a sort of Man of Destiny. To +converse with him was for the ordinary human being like being received +in audience by some more than stand-offish monarch. It had taken Sally +over an hour to persuade him to leave his apartment on Riverside Drive +and revisit the boarding-house for this special occasion; and, when he +had come, he had entered wearing such faultless evening dress that he +had made the rest of the party look like a gathering of tramp-cyclists. +His white waistcoat alone was a silent reproach to honest poverty, and +had caused an awkward constraint right through the soup and fish +courses. Most of those present had known Fillmore Nicholas as an +impecunious young man who could make a tweed suit last longer than one +would have believed possible; they had called him "Fill" and helped him +in more than usually lean times with small loans: but to-night they had +eyed the waistcoat dumbly and shrank back abashed. + +"Speaking," said Mr. Faucitt, "as an Englishman--for though I have long +since taken out what are technically known as my 'papers' it was as a +subject of the island kingdom that I first visited this great country--I +may say that the two factors in American life which have always made the +profoundest impression upon me have been the lavishness of American +hospitality and the charm of the American girl. To-night we have been +privileged to witness the American girl in the capacity of hostess, and +I think I am right in saying, in asseverating, in committing myself to +the statement that his has been a night which none of us present here +will ever forget. Miss Nicholas has given us, ladies and gentlemen, a +banquet. I repeat, a banquet. There has been alcoholic refreshment. I do +not know where it came from: I do not ask how it was procured, but we +have had it. Miss Nicholas..." + +Mr. Faucitt paused to puff at his cigar. Sally's brother Fillmore +suppressed a yawn and glanced at his watch. Sally continued to lean +forward raptly. She knew how happy it made the old gentleman to deliver +a formal speech; and though she wished the subject had been different, +she was prepared to listen indefinitely. + +"Miss Nicholas," resumed Mr. Faucitt, lowering his cigar, "... But why," +he demanded abruptly, "do I call her Miss Nicholas?" + +"Because it's her name," hazarded the taller Murphy. + +Mr. Faucitt eyed him with disfavour. He disapproved of the marvellous +brethren on general grounds because, himself a resident of years +standing, he considered that these transients from the vaudeville stage +lowered the tone of the boarding-house; but particularly because the one +who had just spoken had, on his first evening in the place, addressed +him as "grandpa." + +"Yes, sir," he said severely, "it is her name. But she has another +name, sweeter to those who love her, those who worship her, those who +have watched her with the eye of sedulous affection through the three +years she has spent beneath this roof, though that name," said Mr. +Faucitt, lowering the tone of his address and descending to what might +almost be termed personalities, "may not be familiar to a couple of dud +acrobats who have only been in the place a week-end, thank heaven, and +are off to-morrow to infest some other city. That name," said Mr. +Faucitt, soaring once more to a loftier plane, "is Sally. Our Sally. For +three years our Sally has flitted about this establishment like--I +choose the simile advisedly--like a ray of sunshine. For three years she +has made life for us a brighter, sweeter thing. And now a sudden access +of worldly wealth, happily synchronizing with her twenty-first +birthday, is to remove her from our midst. From our midst, ladies and +gentlemen, but not from our hearts. And I think I may venture to hope, +to prognosticate, that, whatever lofty sphere she may adorn in the +future, to whatever heights in the social world she may soar, she will +still continue to hold a corner in her own golden heart for the comrades +of her Bohemian days. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you our hostess, Miss +Sally Nicholas, coupled with the name of our old friend, her brother +Fillmore." + +Sally, watching her brother heave himself to his feet as the cheers died +away, felt her heart beat a little faster with anticipation. Fillmore +was a fluent young man, once a power in his college debating society, +and it was for that reason that she had insisted on his coming here +tonight. + +She had guessed that Mr. Faucitt, the old dear, would say all sorts of +delightful things about her, and she had mistrusted her ability to make +a fitting reply. And it was imperative that a fitting reply should +proceed from someone. She knew Mr. Faucitt so well. He looked on these +occasions rather in the light of scenes from some play; and, sustaining +his own part in them with such polished grace, was certain to be pained +by anything in the nature of an anti-climax after he should have ceased +to take the stage. Eloquent himself, he must be answered with eloquence, +or his whole evening would be spoiled. + +Fillmore Nicholas smoothed a wrinkle out of his white waistcoat; and +having rested one podgy hand on the table-cloth and the thumb of the +other in his pocket, glanced down the table with eyes so haughtily +drooping that Sally's fingers closed automatically about her orange, as +she wondered whether even now it might not be a good thing... + +It seems to be one of Nature's laws that the most attractive girls +should have the least attractive brothers. Fillmore Nicholas had not +worn well. At the age of seven he had been an extraordinarily beautiful +child, but after that he had gone all to pieces; and now, at the age of +twenty-five, it would be idle to deny that he was something of a mess. +For the three years preceding his twenty-fifth birthday, restricted +means and hard work had kept his figure in check; but with money there +had come an ever-increasing sleekness. He looked as if he fed too often +and too well. + +All this, however, Sally was prepared to forgive him, if he would only +make a good speech. She could see Mr. Faucitt leaning back in his chair, +all courteous attention. Rolling periods were meat and drink to the old +gentleman. + +Fillmore spoke. + +"I'm sure," said Fillmore, "you don't want a speech... Very good of +you to drink our health. Thank you." + +He sat down. + +The effect of these few simple words on the company was marked, but not +in every case identical. To the majority the emotion which they brought +was one of unmixed relief. There had been something so menacing, so easy +and practised, in Fillmore's attitude as he had stood there that the +gloomier-minded had given him at least twenty minutes, and even the +optimists had reckoned that they would be lucky if they got off with +ten. As far as the bulk of the guests were concerned, there was no +grumbling. Fillmore's, to their thinking, had been the ideal +after-dinner speech. + +Far different was it with Mr. Maxwell Faucitt. The poor old man was +wearing such an expression of surprise and dismay as he might have worn +had somebody unexpectedly pulled the chair from under him. He was +feeling the sick shock which comes to those who tread on a non-existent +last stair. And Sally, catching sight of his face, uttered a sharp +wordless exclamation as if she had seen a child fall down and hurt +itself in the street. The next moment she had run round the table and +was standing behind him with her arms round his neck. She spoke across +him with a sob in her voice. + +"My brother," she stammered, directing a malevolent look at the +immaculate Fillmore, who, avoiding her gaze, glanced down his nose and +smoothed another wrinkle out of his waistcoat, "has not said +quite--quite all I hoped he was going to say. I can't make a speech, +but..." Sally gulped, "... but, I love you all and of course I shall +never forget you, and... and..." + +Here Sally kissed Mr. Faucitt and burst into tears. + +"There, there," said Mr. Faucitt, soothingly. The kindest critic could +not have claimed that Sally had been eloquent: nevertheless Mr. Maxwell +Faucitt was conscious of no sense of anti-climax. + + + +2 + + + +Sally had just finished telling her brother Fillmore what a pig he was. +The lecture had taken place in the street outside the boarding-house +immediately on the conclusion of the festivities, when Fillmore, who had +furtively collected his hat and overcoat, had stolen forth into the +night, had been overtaken and brought to bay by his justly indignant +sister. Her remarks, punctuated at intervals by bleating sounds from the +accused, had lasted some ten minutes. + +As she paused for breath, Fillmore seemed to expand, like an indiarubber +ball which has been sat on. Dignified as he was to the world, he had +never been able to prevent himself being intimidated by Sally when in +one of these moods of hers. He regretted this, for it hurt his +self-esteem, but he did not see how the fact could be altered. Sally had +always been like that. Even the uncle, who after the deaths of their +parents had become their guardian, had never, though a grim man, been +able to cope successfully with Sally. In that last hectic scene three +years ago, which had ended in their going out into the world, together +like a second Adam and Eve, the verbal victory had been hers. And it had +been Sally who had achieved triumph in the one battle which Mrs. +Meecher, apparently as a matter of duty, always brought about with each +of her patrons in the first week of their stay. A sweet-tempered girl, +Sally, like most women of a generous spirit, had cyclonic +potentialities. + +As she seemed to have said her say, Fillmore kept on expanding till he +had reached the normal, when he ventured upon a speech for the defence. + +"What have I done?" demanded Fillmore plaintively. + +"Do you want to hear all over again?" + +"No, no," said Fillmore hastily. "But, listen. Sally, you don't +understand my position. You don't seem to realize that all that sort of +thing, all that boarding-house stuff, is a thing of the past. One's got +beyond it. One wants to drop it. One wants to forget it, darn it! Be +fair. Look at it from my viewpoint. I'm going to be a big man ..." + +"You're going to be a fat man," said Sally, coldly. + +Fillmore refrained from discussing the point. He was sensitive. + +"I'm going to do big things," he substituted. "I've got a deal on at +this very moment which... well, I can't tell you about it, but it's +going to be big. Well, what I'm driving at, is about all this sort of +thing"--he indicated the lighted front of Mrs. Meecher's home-from-home +with a wide gesture--"is that it's over. Finished and done with. These +people were all very well when..." + +"... when you'd lost your week's salary at poker and wanted to borrow a +few dollars for the rent." + +"I always paid them back," protested Fillmore, defensively. + +"I did." + +"Well, we did," said Fillmore, accepting the amendment with the air of a +man who has no time for chopping straws. "Anyway, what I mean is, I +don't see why, just because one has known people at a certain period in +one's life when one was practically down and out, one should have them +round one's neck for ever. One can't prevent people forming an +I-knew-him-when club, but, darn it, one needn't attend the meetings." + +"One's friends..." + +"Oh, friends," said Fillmore. "That's just where all this makes me so +tired. One's in a position where all these people are entitled to call +themselves one's friends, simply because father put it in his will that +I wasn't to get the money till I was twenty-five, instead of letting me +have it at twenty-one like anybody else. I wonder where I should have +been by now if I could have got that money when I was twenty-one." + +"In the poor-house, probably," said Sally. + +Fillmore was wounded. + +"Ah! you don't believe in me," he sighed. + +"Oh, you would be all right if you had one thing," said Sally. + +Fillmore passed his qualities in swift review before his mental eye. +Brains? Dash? Spaciousness? Initiative? All present and correct. He +wondered where Sally imagined the hiatus to exist. + +"One thing?" he said. "What's that?" + +"A nurse." + +Fillmore's sense of injury deepened. He supposed that this was always +the way, that those nearest to a man never believed in his ability till +he had proved it so masterfully that it no longer required the +assistance of faith. Still, it was trying; and there was not much +consolation to be derived from the thought that Napoleon had had to go +through this sort of thing in his day. "I shall find my place in the +world," he said sulkily. + +"Oh, you'll find your place all right," said Sally. "And I'll come +round and bring you jelly and read to you on the days when visitors are +allowed... Oh, hullo." + +The last remark was addressed to a young man who had been swinging +briskly along the sidewalk from the direction of Broadway and who now, +coming abreast of them, stopped. + +"Good evening, Mr. Foster." + +"Good evening. Miss Nicholas." + +"You don't know my brother, do you?" + +"I don't believe I do." + +"He left the underworld before you came to it," said Sally. "You +wouldn't think it to look at him, but he was once a prune-eater among +the proletariat, even as you and I. Mrs. Meecher looks on him as a son." + +The two men shook hands. Fillmore was not short, but Gerald Foster with +his lean, well-built figure seemed to tower over him. He was an +Englishman, a man in the middle twenties, clean-shaven, keen-eyed, and +very good to look at. Fillmore, who had recently been going in for one +of those sum-up-your-fellow-man-at-a-glance courses, the better to fit +himself for his career of greatness, was rather impressed. It seemed to +him that this Mr. Foster, like himself, was one of those who Get There. +If you are that kind yourself, you get into the knack of recognizing the +others. It is a sort of gift. + +There was a few moments of desultory conversation, of the kind that +usually follows an introduction, and then Fillmore, by no means sorry to +get the chance, took advantage of the coming of this new arrival to +remove himself. He had not enjoyed his chat with Sally, and it seemed +probable that he would enjoy a continuation of it even less. He was glad +that Mr. Foster had happened along at this particular juncture. Excusing +himself briefly, he hurried off down the street. + +Sally stood for a minute, watching him till he had disappeared round +the corner. She had a slightly regretful feeling that, now it was too +late, she would think of a whole lot more good things which it would +have been agreeable to say to him. And it had become obvious to her that +Fillmore was not getting nearly enough of that kind of thing said to him +nowadays. Then she dismissed him from her mind and turning to Gerald +Foster, slipped her arm through his. + +"Well, Jerry, darling," she said. "What a shame you couldn't come to +the party. Tell me all about everything." + + + +3 + + + +It was exactly two months since Sally had become engaged to Gerald +Foster; but so rigorously had they kept the secret that nobody at Mrs. +Meecher's so much as suspected it. To Sally, who all her life had hated +concealing things, secrecy of any kind was objectionable: but in this +matter Gerald had shown an odd streak almost of furtiveness in his +character. An announced engagement complicated life. People fussed about +you and bothered you. People either watched you or avoided you. Such +were his arguments, and Sally, who would have glossed over and found +excuses for a disposition on his part towards homicide or arson, put +them down to artistic sensitiveness. There is nobody so sensitive as +your artist, particularly if he be unsuccessful: and when an artist has +so little success that he cannot afford to make a home for the woman he +loves, his sensitiveness presumably becomes great indeed. Putting +herself in his place, Sally could see that a protracted engagement, +known by everybody, would be a standing advertisement of Gerald's +failure to make good: and she acquiesced in the policy of secrecy, +hoping that it would not last long. It seemed absurd to think of Gerald +as an unsuccessful man. He had in him, as the recent Fillmore had +perceived, something dynamic. He was one of those men of whom one could +predict that they would succeed very suddenly and rapidly--overnight, as +it were. + +"The party," said Sally, "went off splendidly." They had passed the +boarding-house door, and were walking slowly down the street. "Everybody +enjoyed themselves, I think, even though Fillmore did his best to spoil +things by coming looking like an advertisement of What The Smart Men +Will Wear This Season. You didn't see his waistcoat just now. He had +covered it up. Conscience, I suppose. It was white and bulgy and +gleaming and full up of pearl buttons and everything. I saw Augustus +Bartlett curl up like a burnt feather when he caught sight of it. Still, +time seemed to heal the wound, and everybody relaxed after a bit. Mr. +Faucitt made a speech and I made a speech and cried, and ...oh, it was all +very festive. It only needed you." + +"I wish I could have come. I had to go to that dinner, though. +Sally..." Gerald paused, and Sally saw that he was electric with +suppressed excitement. "Sally, the play's going to be put on!" + +Sally gave a little gasp. She had lived this moment in anticipation for +weeks. She had always known that sooner or later this would happen. She +had read his plays over and over again, and was convinced that they were +wonderful. Of course, hers was a biased view, but then Elsa Doland also +admired them; and Elsa's opinion was one that carried weight. Elsa was +another of those people who were bound to succeed suddenly. Even old Mr. +Faucitt, who was a stern judge of acting and rather inclined to consider +that nowadays there was no such thing, believed that she was a girl with +a future who would do something big directly she got her chance. + +"Jerry!" She gave his arm a hug. "How simply terrific! Then Goble and +Kohn have changed their minds after all and want it? I knew they would." + +A slight cloud seemed to dim the sunniness of the author's mood. + +"No, not that one," he said reluctantly. "No hope there, I'm afraid. I +saw Goble this morning about that, and he said it didn't add up right. +The one that's going to be put on is 'The Primrose Way.' You remember? +It's got a big part for a girl in it." + +"Of course! The one Elsa liked so much. Well, that's just as good. +Who's going to do it? I thought you hadn't sent it out again." + +"Well, it happens..." Gerald hesitated once more. "It seems that this +man I was dining with to-night--a man named Cracknell..." + +"Cracknell? Not the Cracknell?" + +"The Cracknell?" + +"The one people are always talking about. The man they call the +Millionaire Kid." + +"Yes. Why, do you know him?" + +"He was at Harvard with Fillmore. I never saw him, but he must be +rather a painful person." + +"Oh, he's all right. Not much brains, of course, but--well, he's all +right. And, anyway, he wants to put the play on." + +"Well, that's splendid," said Sally: but she could not get the right +ring of enthusiasm into her voice. She had had ideals for Gerald. She +had dreamed of him invading Broadway triumphantly under the banner of +one of the big managers whose name carried a prestige, and there seemed +something unworthy in this association with a man whose chief claim to +eminence lay in the fact that he was credited by metropolitan gossip +with possessing the largest private stock of alcohol in existence. + +"I thought you would be pleased," said Gerald. + +"Oh, I am," said Sally. + +With the buoyant optimism which never deserted her for long, she had +already begun to cast off her momentary depression. After all, did it +matter who financed a play so long as it obtained a production? A +manager was simply a piece of machinery for paying the bills; and if he +had money for that purpose, why demand asceticism and the finer +sensibilities from him? The real thing that mattered was the question of +who was going to play the leading part, that deftly drawn character +which had so excited the admiration of Elsa Doland. She sought +information on this point. + +"Who will play Ruth?" she asked. "You must have somebody wonderful. +It needs a tremendously clever woman. Did Mr. Cracknell say anything +about that?" + +"Oh, yes, we discussed that, of course." + +"Well?" + +"Well, it seems..." Again Sally noticed that odd, almost stealthy +embarrassment. Gerald appeared unable to begin a sentence to-night +without feeling his way into it like a man creeping cautiously down a +dark alley. She noticed it the more because it was so different from his +usual direct method. Gerald, as a rule, was not one of those who +apologize for themselves. He was forthright and masterful and inclined +to talk to her from a height. To-night he seemed different. + +He broke off, was silent for a moment, and began again with a question. + +"Do you know Mabel Hobson?" + +"Mabel Hobson? I've seen her in the 'Follies,' of course." + +Sally started. A suspicion had stung her, so monstrous that its +absurdity became manifest the moment it had formed. And yet was it +absurd? Most Broadway gossip filtered eventually into the +boarding-house, chiefly through the medium of that seasoned sport, the +mild young man who thought so highly of the redoubtable Benny Whistler, +and she was aware that the name of Reginald Cracknell, which was always +getting itself linked with somebody, had been coupled with that of Miss +Hobson. It seemed likely that in this instance rumour spoke truth, for +the lady was of that compellingly blonde beauty which attracts the +Cracknells of this world. But even so... + +"It seems that Cracknell..." said Gerald. "Apparently this man +Cracknell..." He was finding Sally's bright, horrified gaze somewhat +trying. "Well, the fact is Cracknell believes in Mabel Hobson...and... +well, he thinks this part would suit her." + +"Oh, Jerry!" + +Could infatuation go to such a length? Could even the spacious heart of +a Reginald Cracknell so dominate that gentleman's small size in heads as +to make him entrust a part like Ruth in "The Primrose Way" to one who, +when desired by the producer of her last revue to carry a bowl of roses +across the stage and place it on a table, had rebelled on the plea that +she had not been engaged as a dancer? Surely even lovelorn Reginald +could perceive that this was not the stuff of which great emotional +actresses are made. + +"Oh, Jerry!" she said again. + +There was an uncomfortable silence. They turned and walked back in the +direction of the boarding-house. Somehow Gerald's arm had managed to get +itself detached from Sally's. She was conscious of a curious dull ache +that was almost like a physical pain. + +"Jerry! Is it worth it?" she burst out vehemently. + +The question seemed to sting the young man into something like his +usual decisive speech. + +"Worth it? Of course it's worth it. It's a Broadway production. +That's all that matters. Good heavens! I've been trying long enough to +get a play on Broadway, and it isn't likely that I'm going to chuck away +my chance when it comes along just because one might do better in the +way of casting." + +"But, Jerry! Mabel Hobson! It's... it's murder! Murder in the first +degree." + +"Nonsense. She'll be all right. The part will play itself. Besides, +she has a personality and a following, and Cracknell will spend all the +money in the world to make the thing a success. And it will be a start, +whatever happens. Of course, it's worth it." + +Fillmore would have been impressed by this speech. He would have +recognized and respected in it the unmistakable ring which characterizes +even the lightest utterances of those who get there. On Sally it had not +immediately that effect. Nevertheless, her habit of making the best of +things, working together with that primary article of her creed that the +man she loved could do no wrong, succeeded finally in raising her +spirits. Of course Jerry was right. It would have been foolish to refuse +a contract because all its clauses were not ideal. + +"You old darling," she said affectionately attaching herself to the +vacant arm once more and giving it a penitent squeeze, "you're quite +right. Of course you are. I can see it now. I was only a little startled +at first. Everything's going to be wonderful. Let's get all our chickens +out and count 'em. How are you going to spend the money?" + +"I know how I'm going to spend a dollar of it," said Gerald completely +restored. + +"I mean the big money. What's a dollar?" + +"It pays for a marriage-licence." + +Sally gave his arm another squeeze. + +"Ladies and gentlemen," she said. "Look at this man. Observe him. My +partner!" + + + + + + + +CHAPTER II + + + +ENTER GINGER + + + +1 + + + +Sally was sitting with her back against a hillock of golden sand, +watching with half-closed eyes the denizens of Roville-sur-Mer at their +familiar morning occupations. At Roville, as at most French seashore +resorts, the morning is the time when the visiting population assembles +in force on the beach. Whiskered fathers of families made cheerful +patches of colour in the foreground. Their female friends and relatives +clustered in groups under gay parasols. Dogs roamed to and fro, and +children dug industriously with spades, ever and anon suspending their +labours in order to smite one another with these handy implements. One +of the dogs, a poodle of military aspect, wandered up to Sally: and +discovering that she was in possession of a box of sweets, decided to +remain and await developments. + +Few things are so pleasant as the anticipation of them, but Sally's +vacation had proved an exception to this rule. It had been a magic month +of lazy happiness. She had drifted luxuriously from one French town to +another, till the charm of Roville, with its blue sky, its Casino, its +snow-white hotels along the Promenade, and its general glitter and +gaiety, had brought her to a halt. Here she could have stayed +indefinitely, but the voice of America was calling her back. Gerald had +written to say that "The Primrose Way" was to be produced in Detroit, +preliminary to its New York run, so soon that, if she wished to see the +opening, she must return at once. A scrappy, hurried, unsatisfactory +letter, the letter of a busy man: but one that Sally could not ignore. +She was leaving Roville to-morrow. + +To-day, however, was to-day: and she sat and watched the bathers with a +familiar feeling of peace, revelling as usual in the still novel +sensation of having nothing to do but bask in the warm sunshine and +listen to the faint murmur of the little waves. + +But, if there was one drawback, she had discovered, to a morning on the +Roville plage, it was that you had a tendency to fall asleep: and this +is a degrading thing to do so soon after breakfast, even if you are on a +holiday. Usually, Sally fought stoutly against the temptation, but +to-day the sun was so warm and the whisper of the waves so insinuating +that she had almost dozed off, when she was aroused by voices close at +hand. There were many voices on the beach, both near and distant, but +these were talking English, a novelty in Roville, and the sound of the +familiar tongue jerked Sally back from the borders of sleep. A few feet +away, two men had seated themselves on the sand. + +From the first moment she had set out on her travels, it had been one of +Sally's principal amusements to examine the strangers whom chance threw +in her way and to try by the light of her intuition to fit them out with +characters and occupations: nor had she been discouraged by an almost +consistent failure to guess right. Out of the corner of her eye she +inspected these two men. + +The first of the pair did not attract her. He was a tall, dark man +whose tight, precise mouth and rather high cheeks bones gave him an +appearance vaguely sinister. He had the dusky look of the clean-shaven +man whose life is a perpetual struggle with a determined beard. He +certainly shaved twice a day, and just as certainly had the self-control +not to swear when he cut himself. She could picture him smiling nastily +when this happened. + +"Hard," diagnosed Sally. "I shouldn't like him. A lawyer or something, +I think." + +She turned to the other and found herself looking into his eyes. This +was because he had been staring at Sally with the utmost intentness ever +since his arrival. His mouth had opened slightly. He had the air of a +man who, after many disappointments, has at last found something worth +looking at. + +"Rather a dear," decided Sally. + +He was a sturdy, thick-set young man with an amiable, freckled face and +the reddest hair Sally had ever seen. He had a square chin, and at one +angle of the chin a slight cut. And Sally was convinced that, however he +had behaved on receipt of that wound, it had not been with superior +self-control. + +"A temper, I should think," she meditated. "Very quick, but soon over. +Not very clever, I should say, but nice." + +She looked away, finding his fascinated gaze a little embarrassing. + +The dark man, who in the objectionably competent fashion which, one +felt, characterized all his actions, had just succeeded in lighting a +cigarette in the teeth of a strong breeze, threw away the match and +resumed the conversation, which had presumably been interrupted by the +process of sitting down. + +"And how is Scrymgeour?" he inquired. + +"Oh, all right," replied the young man with red hair absently. Sally +was looking straight in front of her, but she felt that his eyes were +still busy. + +"I was surprised at his being here. He told me he meant to stay in +Paris." + +There was a slight pause. Sally gave the attentive poodle a piece of +nougat. + +"I say," observed the red-haired young man in clear, penetrating tones +that vibrated with intense feeling, "that's the prettiest girl I've seen +in my life!" + + + +2 + + + +At this frank revelation of the red-haired young man's personal +opinions, Sally, though considerably startled, was not displeased. A +broad-minded girl, the outburst seemed to her a legitimate comment on a +matter of public interest. The young man's companion, on the other hand, +was unmixedly shocked. + +"My dear fellow!" he ejaculated. + +"Oh, it's all right," said the red-haired young man, unmoved. "She +can't understand. There isn't a bally soul in this dashed place that can +speak a word of English. If I didn't happen to remember a few odd bits +of French, I should have starved by this time. That girl," he went on, +returning to the subject most imperatively occupying his mind, "is an +absolute topper! I give you my solemn word I've never seen anybody to +touch her. Look at those hands and feet. You don't get them outside +France. Of course, her mouth is a bit wide," he said reluctantly. + +Sally's immobility, added to the other's assurance concerning the +linguistic deficiencies of the inhabitants of Roville, seemed to +reassure the dark man. He breathed again. At no period of his life had +he ever behaved with anything but the most scrupulous correctness +himself, but he had quailed at the idea of being associated even +remotely with incorrectness in another. It had been a black moment for +him when the red-haired young man had uttered those few kind words. + +"Still you ought to be careful," he said austerely. + +He looked at Sally, who was now dividing her attention between the +poodle and a raffish-looking mongrel, who had joined the party, and +returned to the topic of the mysterious Scrymgeour. + +"How is Scrymgeour's dyspepsia?" + +The red-haired young man seemed but faintly interested in the +vicissitudes of Scrymgeour's interior. + +"Do you notice the way her hair sort of curls over her ears?" he said. +"Eh? Oh, pretty much the same, I think." + +"What hotel are you staying at?" + +"The Normandie." + +Sally, dipping into the box for another chocolate cream, gave an +imperceptible start. She, too, was staying at the Normandie. She +presumed that her admirer was a recent arrival, for she had seen nothing +of him at the hotel. + +"The Normandie?" The dark man looked puzzled. "I know Roville pretty +well by report, but I've never heard of any Hotel Normandie. Where is +it?" + +"It's a little shanty down near the station. Not much of a place. +Still, it's cheap, and the cooking's all right." + +His companion's bewilderment increased. + +"What on earth is a man like Scrymgeour doing there?" he said. Sally +was conscious of an urgent desire to know more and more about the absent +Scrymgeour. Constant repetition of his name had made him seem almost +like an old friend. "If there's one thing he's fussy about..." + +"There are at least eleven thousand things he's fussy about," +interrupted the red-haired young man disapprovingly. "Jumpy old +blighter!" + +"If there's one thing he's particular about, it's the sort of hotel he +goes to. Ever since I've known him he has always wanted the best. I +should have thought he would have gone to the Splendide." He mused on +this problem in a dissatisfied sort of way for a moment, then seemed to +reconcile himself to the fact that a rich man's eccentricities must be +humoured. "I'd like to see him again. Ask him if he will dine with me at +the Splendide to-night. Say eight sharp." + +Sally, occupied with her dogs, whose numbers had now been augmented by a +white terrier with a black patch over its left eye, could not see the +young man's face: but his voice, when he replied, told her that +something was wrong. There was a false airiness in it. + +"Oh, Scrymgeour isn't in Roville." + +"No? Where is he?" + +"Paris, I believe." + +"What!" The dark man's voice sharpened. He sounded as though he were +cross-examining a reluctant witness. "Then why aren't you there? What +are you doing here? Did he give you a holiday?" + +"Yes, he did." + +"When do you rejoin him?" + +"I don't." + +"What!" + +The red-haired young man's manner was not unmistakably dogged. + +"Well, if you want to know," he said, "the old blighter fired me the day +before yesterday." + + + +3 + + + +There was a shuffling of sand as the dark man sprang up. Sally, intent +on the drama which was unfolding itself beside her, absent-mindedly gave +the poodle a piece of nougat which should by rights have gone to the +terrier. She shot a swift glance sideways, and saw the dark man standing +in an attitude rather reminiscent of the stern father of melodrama about +to drive his erring daughter out into the snow. The red-haired young +man, outwardly stolid, was gazing before him down the beach at a fat +bather in an orange suit who, after six false starts, was now actually +in the water, floating with the dignity of a wrecked balloon. + +"Do you mean to tell me," demanded the dark man, "that, after all the +trouble the family took to get you what was practically a sinecure with +endless possibilities if you only behaved yourself, you have +deliberately thrown away..." A despairing gesture completed the +sentence. "Good God, you're hopeless!" + +The red-haired young man made no reply. He continued to gaze down the +beach. Of all outdoor sports, few are more stimulating than watching +middle-aged Frenchmen bathe. Drama, action, suspense, all are here. From +the first stealthy testing of the water with an apprehensive toe to the +final seal-like plunge, there is never a dull moment. And apart from the +excitement of the thing, judging it from a purely aesthetic standpoint, +his must be a dull soul who can fail to be uplifted by the spectacle of +a series of very stout men with whiskers, seen in tight bathing suits +against a background of brightest blue. Yet the young man with red hair, +recently in the employment of Mr. Scrymgeour, eyed this free circus +without any enjoyment whatever. + +"It's maddening! What are you going to do? What do you expect us to do? +Are we to spend our whole lives getting you positions which you won't +keep? I can tell you we're... it's monstrous! It's sickening! Good God!" + +And with these words the dark man, apparently feeling, as Sally had +sometimes felt in the society of her brother Fillmore, the futility of +mere language, turned sharply and stalked away up the beach, the dignity +of his exit somewhat marred a moment later by the fact of his straw hat +blowing off and being trodden on by a passing child. + +He left behind him the sort of electric calm which follows the falling +of a thunderbolt; that stunned calm through which the air seems still to +quiver protestingly. How long this would have lasted one cannot say: for +towards the end of the first minute it was shattered by a purely +terrestrial uproar. With an abruptness heralded only by one short, low +gurgling snarl, there sprang into being the prettiest dog fight that +Roville had seen that season. + +It was the terrier with the black patch who began it. That was Sally's +opinion: and such, one feels, will be the verdict of history. His best +friend, anxious to make out a case for him, could not have denied that +he fired the first gun of the campaign. But we must be just. The fault +was really Sally's. Absorbed in the scene which had just concluded and +acutely inquisitive as to why the shadowy Scrymgeour had seen fit to +dispense with the red-haired young man's services, she had thrice in +succession helped the poodle out of his turn. The third occasion was too +much for the terrier. + +There is about any dog fight a wild, gusty fury which affects the +average mortal with something of the helplessness induced by some vast +clashing of the elements. It seems so outside one's jurisdiction. One is +oppressed with a sense of the futility of interference. And this was no +ordinary dog fight. It was a stunning mêlée, which would have excited +favourable comment even among the blasé residents of a negro quarter or +the not easily-pleased critics of a Lancashire mining-village. From all +over the beach dogs of every size, breed, and colour were racing to the +scene: and while some of these merely remained in the ringside seats and +barked, a considerable proportion immediately started fighting one +another on general principles, well content to be in action without +bothering about first causes. The terrier had got the poodle by the left +hind-leg and was restating his war-aims. The raffish mongrel was +apparently endeavouring to fletcherize a complete stranger of the +Sealyham family. + +Sally was frankly unequal to the situation, as were the entire crowd of +spectators who had come galloping up from the water's edge. She had been +paralysed from the start. Snarling bundles bumped against her legs and +bounced away again, but she made no move. Advice in fluent French rent +the air. Arms waved, and well-filled bathing suits leaped up and down. +But nobody did anything practical until in the centre of the theatre of +war there suddenly appeared the red-haired young man. + +The only reason why dog fights do not go on for ever is that Providence +has decided that on each such occasion there shall always be among those +present one Master Mind; one wizard who, whatever his shortcomings in +other battles of life, is in this single particular sphere competent and +dominating. At Roville-sur-Mer it was the red-haired young man. His dark +companion might have turned from him in disgust: his services might not +have seemed worth retaining by the haughty Scrymgeour: he might be a +pain in the neck to "the family"; but he did know how to stop a dog +fight. From the first moment of his intervention calm began to steal +over the scene. He had the same effect on the almost inextricably +entwined belligerents as, in mediaeval legend, the Holy Grail, sliding +down the sunbeam, used to have on battling knights. He did not look like +a dove of peace, but the most captious could not have denied that he +brought home the goods. There was a magic in his soothing hands, a spell +in his voice: and in a shorter time than one would have believed +possible dog after dog had been sorted out and calmed down; until +presently all that was left of Armageddon was one solitary small Scotch +terrier, thoughtfully licking a chewed leg. The rest of the combatants, +once more in their right mind and wondering what all the fuss was about, +had been captured and haled away in a whirl of recrimination by voluble +owners. + +Having achieved this miracle, the young man turned to Sally. Gallant, +one might say reckless, as he had been a moment before, he now gave +indications of a rather pleasing shyness. He braced himself with that +painful air of effort which announces to the world that an Englishman is +about to speak a language other than his own. + +"J'espère," he said, having swallowed once or twice to brace himself up +for the journey through the jungle of a foreign tongue, "J'espère que +vous n'êtes pas--oh, dammit, what's the word--J'espère que vous n'êtes +pas blessée?" + +"Blessée?" + +"Yes, blessée. Wounded. Hurt, don't you know. Bitten. Oh, dash it. +J'espère..." + +"Oh, bitten!" said Sally, dimpling. "Oh, no, thanks very much. I +wasn't bitten. And I think it was awfully brave of you to save all our +lives." + +The compliment seemed to pass over the young man's head. He stared at +Sally with horrified eyes. Over his amiable face there swept a vivid +blush. His jaw dropped. + +"Oh, my sainted aunt!" he ejaculated. + +Then, as if the situation was too much for him and flights the only +possible solution, he spun round and disappeared at a walk so rapid that +it was almost a run. Sally watched him go and was sorry that he had torn +himself away. She still wanted to know why Scrymgeour had fired him. + + + +4 + + + +Bedtime at Roville is an hour that seems to vary according to one's +proximity to the sea. The gilded palaces along the front keep deplorable +hours, polluting the night air till dawn with indefatigable jazz: but at +the pensions of the economical like the Normandie, early to bed is the +rule. True, Jules, the stout young native who combined the offices of +night-clerk and lift attendant at that establishment, was on duty in the +hall throughout the night, but few of the Normandie's patrons made use +of his services. + +Sally, entering shortly before twelve o'clock on the night of the day on +which the dark man, the red-haired young man, and their friend +Scrymgeour had come into her life, found the little hall dim and silent. +Through the iron cage of the lift a single faint bulb glowed: another, +over the desk in the far corner, illuminated the upper half of Jules, +slumbering in a chair. Jules seemed to Sally to be on duty in some +capacity or other all the time. His work, like women's, was never done. +He was now restoring his tissues with a few winks of much-needed beauty +sleep. Sally, who had been to the Casino to hear the band and afterwards +had strolled on the moonlit promenade, had a guilty sense of intrusion. + +As she stood there, reluctant to break in on Jules' rest--for her +sympathetic heart, always at the disposal of the oppressed, had long +ached for this overworked peon--she was relieved to hear footsteps in +the street outside, followed by the opening of the front door. If Jules +would have had to wake up anyway, she felt her sense of responsibility +lessened. The door, having opened, closed again with a bang. Jules +stirred, gurgled, blinked, and sat up, and Sally, turning, perceived +that the new arrival was the red-haired young man. + +"Oh, good evening," said Sally welcomingly. + +The young man stopped, and shuffled uncomfortably. The morning's +happenings were obviously still green in his memory. He had either not +ceased blushing since their last meeting or he was celebrating their +reunion by beginning to blush again: for his face was a familiar +scarlet. + +"Er--good evening," he said, disentangling his feet, which, in the +embarrassment of the moment, had somehow got coiled up together. + +"Or bon soir, I suppose you would say," murmured Sally. + +The young man acknowledged receipt of this thrust by dropping his hat +and tripping over it as he stooped to pick it up. + +Jules, meanwhile, who had been navigating in a sort of somnambulistic +trance in the neighbourhood of the lift, now threw back the cage with a +rattle. + +"It's a shame to have woken you up," said Sally, commiseratingly, +stepping in. + +Jules did not reply, for the excellent reason that he had not been woken +up. Constant practice enabled him to do this sort of work without +breaking his slumber. His brain, if you could call it that, was working +automatically. He had shut up the gate with a clang and was tugging +sluggishly at the correct rope, so that the lift was going slowly up +instead of retiring down into the basement, but he was not awake. + +Sally and the red-haired young man sat side by side on the small seat, +watching their conductor's efforts. After the first spurt, conversation +had languished. Sally had nothing of immediate interest to say, and her +companion seemed to be one of these strong, silent men you read about. +Only a slight snore from Jules broke the silence. + +At the third floor Sally leaned forward and prodded Jules in the lower +ribs. All through her stay at Roville, she had found in dealing with the +native population that actions spoke louder than words. If she wanted +anything in a restaurant or at a shop, she pointed; and, when she wished +the lift to stop, she prodded the man in charge. It was a system worth a +dozen French conversation books. + +Jules brought the machine to a halt: and it was at this point that he +should have done the one thing connected with his professional +activities which he did really well--the opening, to wit, of the iron +cage. There are ways of doing this. Jules' was the right way. He was +accustomed to do it with a flourish, and generally remarked "V'la!" in a +modest but self-congratulatory voice as though he would have liked to +see another man who could have put through a job like that. Jules' +opinion was that he might not be much to look at, but that he could open +a lift door. + +To-night, however, it seemed as if even this not very exacting feat was +beyond his powers. Instead of inserting his key in the lock, he stood +staring in an attitude of frozen horror. He was a man who took most +things in life pretty seriously, and whatever was the little difficulty +just now seemed to have broken him all up. + +"There appears," said Sally, turning to her companion, "to be a hitch. +Would you mind asking what's the matter? I don't know any French myself +except 'oo la la!'" + +The young man, thus appealed to, nerved himself to the task. He eyed +the melancholy Jules doubtfully, and coughed in a strangled sort of way. + +"Oh, esker... esker vous..." + +"Don't weaken," said Sally. "I think you've got him going." + +"Esker vous... Pourquoi vous ne... I mean ne vous... that is to say, +quel est le raison..." + +He broke off here, because at this point Jules began to explain. He +explained very rapidly and at considerable length. The fact that neither +of his hearers understood a word of what he was saying appeared not to +have impressed itself upon him. Or, if he gave a thought to it, he +dismissed the objection as trifling. He wanted to explain, and he +explained. Words rushed from him like water from a geyser. Sounds which +you felt you would have been able to put a meaning to if he had detached +them from the main body and repeated them slowly, went swirling down the +stream and were lost for ever. + +"Stop him!" said Sally firmly. + +The red-haired young man looked as a native of Johnstown might have +looked on being requested to stop that city's celebrated flood. + +"Stop him?" + +"Yes. Blow a whistle or something." + +Out of the depths of the young man's memory there swam to the surface a +single word--a word which he must have heard somewhere or read +somewhere: a legacy, perhaps, from long-vanished school-days. + +"Zut!" he barked, and instantaneously Jules turned himself off at the +main. There was a moment of dazed silence, such as might occur in a +boiler-factory if the works suddenly shut down. + +"Quick! Now you've got him!" cried Sally. "Ask him what he's talking +about--if he knows, which I doubt--and tell him to speak slowly. Then +we shall get somewhere." + +The young man nodded intelligently. The advice was good. + +"Lentement," he said. "Parlez lentement. Pas si--you know what I +mean--pas si dashed vite!" + +"Ah-a-ah!" cried Jules, catching the idea on the fly. "Lentement. Ah, +oui, lentement." + +There followed a lengthy conversation which, while conveying nothing to +Sally, seemed intelligible to the red-haired linguist. + +"The silly ass," he was able to announce some few minutes later, "has +made a bloomer. Apparently he was half asleep when we came in, and he +shoved us into the lift and slammed the door, forgetting that he had +left the keys on the desk." + +"I see," said Sally. "So we're shut in?" + +"I'm afraid so. I wish to goodness," said the young man, "I knew French +well. I'd curse him with some vim and not a little animation, the chump! +I wonder what 'blighter' is in French," he said, meditating. + +"It's the merest suggestion," said Sally, "but oughtn't we to do +something?" + +"What could we do?" + +"Well, for one thing, we might all utter a loud yell. It would scare +most of the people in the hotel to death, but there might be a survivor +or two who would come and investigate and let us out." + +"What a ripping idea!" said the young man, impressed. + +"I'm glad you like it. Now tell him the main out-line, or he'll think +we've gone mad." + +The young man searched for words, and eventually found some which +expressed his meaning lamely but well enough to cause Jules to nod in a +depressed sort of way. + +"Fine!" said Sally. "Now, all together at the word 'three.' +One--two--Oh, poor darling!" she broke off. "Look at him!" + +In the far corner of the lift, the emotional Jules was sobbing silently +into the bunch of cotton-waste which served him in the office of a +pocket-handkerchief. His broken-hearted gulps echoed hollowly down the +shaft. + + + +5 + + + +In these days of cheap books of instruction on every subject under the +sun, we most of us know how to behave in the majority of life's little +crises. We have only ourselves to blame if we are ignorant of what to do +before the doctor comes, of how to make a dainty winter coat for baby +out of father's last year's under-vest and of the best method of coping +with the cold mutton. But nobody yet has come forward with practical +advice as to the correct method of behaviour to be adopted when a +lift-attendant starts crying. And Sally and her companion, as a +consequence, for a few moments merely stared at each other helplessly. + +"Poor darling!" said Sally, finding speech. "Ask him what's the +matter." + +The young man looked at her doubtfully. + +"You know," he said, "I don't enjoy chatting with this blighter. I mean +to say, it's a bit of an effort. I don't know why it is, but talking +French always makes me feel as if my nose were coming off. Couldn't we +just leave him to have his cry out by himself?" + +"The idea!" said Sally. "Have you no heart? Are you one of those fiends +in human shape?" + +He turned reluctantly to Jules, and paused to overhaul his vocabulary. + +"You ought to be thankful for this chance," said Sally. "It's the only +real way of learning French, and you're getting a lesson for nothing. +What did he say then?" + +"Something about losing something, it seemed to me. I thought I caught +the word perdu." + +"But that means a partridge, doesn't it? I'm sure I've seen it on the +menus." + +"Would he talk about partridges at a time like this?" + +"He might. The French are extraordinary people." + +"Well, I'll have another go at him. But he's a difficult chap to chat +with. If you give him the least encouragement, he sort of goes off like +a rocket." He addressed another question to the sufferer, and listened +attentively to the voluble reply. + +"Oh!" he said with sudden enlightenment. "Your job?" He turned to +Sally. "I got it that time," he said. "The trouble is, he says, that if +we yell and rouse the house, we'll get out all right, but he will lose +his job, because this is the second time this sort of thing has +happened, and they warned him last time that once more would mean the +push." + +"Then we mustn't dream of yelling," said Sally, decidedly. "It means a +pretty long wait, you know. As far as I can gather, there's just a +chance of somebody else coming in later, in which case he could let us +out. But it's doubtful. He rather thinks that everybody has gone to +roost." + +"Well, we must try it. I wouldn't think of losing the poor man his job. +Tell him to take the car down to the ground-floor, and then we'll just +sit and amuse ourselves till something happens. We've lots to talk +about. We can tell each other the story of our lives." + +Jules, cheered by his victims' kindly forbearance, lowered the car to +the ground floor, where, after a glance of infinite longing at the keys +on the distant desk, the sort of glance which Moses must have cast at +the Promised Land from the summit of Mount Pisgah, he sagged down in a +heap and resumed his slumbers. Sally settled herself as comfortably as +possible in her corner. + +"You'd better smoke," she said. "It will be something to do." + +"Thanks awfully." + +"And now," said Sally, "tell me why Scrymgeour fired you." + +Little by little, under the stimulating influence of this nocturnal +adventure, the red-haired young man had lost that shy confusion which +had rendered him so ill at ease when he had encountered Sally in the +hall of the hotel; but at this question embarrassment gripped him once +more. Another of those comprehensive blushes of his raced over his face, +and he stammered. + +"I say, I'm glad... I'm fearfully sorry about that, you know!" + +"About Scrymgeour?" + +"You know what I mean. I mean, about making such a most ghastly ass of +myself this morning. I... I never dreamed you understood English." + +"Why, I didn't object. I thought you were very nice and complimentary. +Of course, I don't know how many girls you've seen in your life, but..." + +"No, I say, don't! It makes me feel such a chump." + +"And I'm sorry about my mouth. It is wide. But I know you're a +fair-minded man and realize that it isn't my fault." + +"Don't rub it in," pleaded the young man. "As a matter of fact, if you +want to know, I think your mouth is absolutely perfect. I think," he +proceeded, a little feverishly, "that you are the most indescribable +topper that ever..." + +"You were going to tell me about Scrymgeour," said Sally. + +The young man blinked as if he had collided with some hard object while +sleep-walking. Eloquence had carried him away. + +"Scrymgeour?" he said. "Oh, that would bore you." + +"Don't be silly," said Sally reprovingly. "Can't you realize that we're +practically castaways on a desert island? There's nothing to do till +to-morrow but talk about ourselves. I want to hear all about you, and +then I'll tell you all about myself. If you feel diffident about +starting the revelations, I'll begin. Better start with names. Mine is +Sally Nicholas. What's yours?" + +"Mine? Oh, ah, yes, I see what you mean." + +"I thought you would. I put it as clearly as I could. Well, what is +it?" + +"Kemp." + +"And the first name?" + +"Well, as a matter of fact," said the young man, "I've always rather +hushed up my first name, because when I was christened they worked a +low-down trick on me!" + +"You can't shock me," said Sally, encouragingly. "My father's name was +Ezekiel, and I've a brother who was christened Fillmore." + +Mr. Kemp brightened. "Well, mine isn't as bad as that... No, I don't +mean that," he broke off apologetically. "Both awfully jolly names, of +course..." + +"Get on," said Sally. + +"Well, they called me Lancelot. And, of course, the thing is that I +don't look like a Lancelot and never shall. My pals," he added in a more +cheerful strain, "call me Ginger." + +"I don't blame them," said Sally. + +"Perhaps you wouldn't mind thinking of me as Ginger?'' suggested the +young man diffidently. + +"Certainly." + +"That's awfully good of you." + +"Not at all." + +Jules stirred in his sleep and grunted. No other sound came to disturb +the stillness of the night. + +"You were going to tell me about yourself?" said Mr. Lancelot (Ginger) +Kemp. + +"I'm going to tell you all about myself," said Sally, "not because I +think it will interest you..." + +"Oh, it will!" + +"Not, I say, because I think it will interest you..." + +"It will, really." + +Sally looked at him coldly. + +"Is this a duet?" she inquired, "or have I the floor?" + +"I'm awfully sorry." + +"Not, I repeat for the third time, because I think It will interest you, +but because if I do you won't have any excuse for not telling me your +life-history, and you wouldn't believe how inquisitive I am. Well, in +the first place, I live in America. I'm over here on a holiday. And it's +the first real holiday I've had in three years--since I left home, in +fact." Sally paused. "I ran away from home," she said. + +"Good egg!" said Ginger Kemp. + +"I beg your pardon?" + +"I mean, quite right. I bet you were quite right." + +"When I say home," Sally went on, "it was only a sort of imitation home, +you know. One of those just-as-good homes which are never as +satisfactory as the real kind. My father and mother both died a good +many years ago. My brother and I were dumped down on the reluctant +doorstep of an uncle." + +"Uncles," said Ginger Kemp, feelingly, "are the devil. I've got an... +but I'm interrupting you." + +"My uncle was our trustee. He had control of all my brother's money and +mine till I was twenty-one. My brother was to get his when he was +twenty-five. My poor father trusted him blindly, and what do you think +happened?" + +"Good Lord! The blighter embezzled the lot?" + +"No, not a cent. Wasn't it extraordinary! Have you ever heard of a +blindly trusted uncle who was perfectly honest? Well, mine was. But the +trouble was that, while an excellent man to have looking after one's +money, he wasn't a very lovable character. He was very hard. Hard! He +was as hard as--well, nearly as hard as this seat. He hated poor +Fill..." + +"Phil?" + +"I broke it to you just now that my brother's name was Fillmore." + +"Oh, your brother. Oh, ah, yes." + +"He was always picking on poor Fill. And I'm bound to say that Fill +rather laid himself out as what you might call a pickee. He was always +getting into trouble. One day, about three years ago, he was expelled +from Harvard, and my uncle vowed he would have nothing more to do with +him. So I said, if Fill left, I would leave. And, as this seemed to be +my uncle's idea of a large evening, no objection was raised, and Fill +and I departed. We went to New York, and there we've been ever since. +About six months' ago Fill passed the twenty-five mark and collected his +money, and last month I marched past the given point and got mine. So it +all ends happily, you see. Now tell me about yourself." + +"But, I say, you know, dash it, you've skipped a lot. I mean to say, +you must have had an awful time in New York, didn't you? How on earth +did you get along?" + +"Oh, we found work. My brother tried one or two things, and finally +became an assistant stage-manager with some theatre people. The only +thing I could do, having been raised in enervating luxury, was ballroom +dancing, so I ball-room danced. I got a job at a place in Broadway +called 'The Flower Garden' as what is humorously called an +'instructress,' as if anybody could 'instruct' the men who came there. +One was lucky if one saved one's life and wasn't quashed to death." + +"How perfectly foul!" + +"Oh, I don't know. It was rather fun for a while. Still," said Sally, +meditatively, "I'm not saying I could have held out much longer: I was +beginning to give. I suppose I've been trampled underfoot by more fat +men than any other girl of my age in America. I don't know why it was, +but every man who came in who was a bit overweight seemed to make for me +by instinct. That's why I like to sit on the sands here and watch these +Frenchmen bathing. It's just heavenly to lie back and watch a two +hundred and fifty pound man, coming along and feel that he isn't going +to dance with me." + +"But, I say! How absolutely rotten it must have been for you!" + +"Well, I'll tell you one thing. It's going to make me a very +domesticated wife one of these days. You won't find me gadding about in +gilded jazz-palaces! For me, a little place in the country somewhere, +with my knitting and an Elsie book, and bed at half-past nine! And now +tell me the story of your life. And make it long because I'm perfectly +certain there's going to be no relief-expedition. I'm sure the last +dweller under this roof came in years ago. We shall be here till +morning." + +"I really think we had better shout, you know." + +"And lose Jules his job? Never!" + +"Well, of course, I'm sorry for poor old Jules' troubles, but I hate to +think of you having to..." + +"Now get on with the story," said Sally. + + + +6 + + + +Ginger Kemp exhibited some of the symptoms of a young bridegroom called +upon at a wedding-breakfast to respond to the toast. He moved his feet +restlessly and twisted his fingers. + +"I hate talking about myself, you know," he said. + +"So I supposed," said Sally. "That's why I gave you my autobiography +first, to give you no chance of backing out. Don't be such a shrinking +violet. We're all shipwrecked mariners here. I am intensely interested +in your narrative. And, even if I wasn't, I'd much rather listen to it +than to Jules' snoring." + +"He is snoring a bit, what? Does it annoy you? Shall I stir him?" + +"You seem to have an extraordinary brutal streak in your nature," said +Sally. "You appear to think of nothing else but schemes for harassing +poor Jules. Leave him alone for a second, and start telling me about +yourself." + +"Where shall I start?" + +"Well, not with your childhood, I think. We'll skip that." + +"Well..." Ginger Kemp knitted his brow, searching for a dramatic +opening. "Well, I'm more or less what you might call an orphan, like +you. I mean to say, both my people are dead and all that sort of thing." + +"Thanks for explaining. That has made it quite clear." + +"I can't remember my mother. My father died when I was in my last year +at Cambridge. I'd been having a most awfully good time at the 'varsity,'" +said Ginger, warming to his theme. "Not thick, you know, but good. I'd +got my rugger and boxing blues and I'd just been picked for scrum-half +for England against the North in the first trial match, and between +ourselves it really did look as if I was more or less of a snip for my +international." + +Sally gazed at him wide eyed. + +"Is that good or bad?" she asked. + +"Eh?" + +"Are you reciting a catalogue of your crimes, or do you expect me to get +up and cheer? What is a rugger blue, to start with?" + +"Well, it's... it's a rugger blue, you know." + +"Oh, I see," said Sally. "You mean a rugger blue." + +"I mean to say, I played rugger--footer--that's to say, football--Rugby +football--for Cambridge, against Oxford. I was scrum-half." + +"And what is a scrum-half?" asked Sally, patiently. "Yes, I know you're +going to say it's a scrum-half, but can't you make it easier?" + +"The scrum-half," said Ginger, "is the half who works the scrum. He +slings the pill out to the fly-half, who starts the three-quarters +going. I don't know if you understand?" + +"I don't." + +"It's dashed hard to explain," said Ginger Kemp, unhappily. "I mean, I +don't think I've ever met anyone before who didn't know what a +scrum-half was." + +"Well, I can see that it has something to do with football, so we'll +leave it at that. I suppose it's something like our quarter-back. And +what's an international?" + +"It's called getting your international when you play for England, you +know. England plays Wales, France, Ireland, and Scotland. If it hadn't +been for the smash, I think I should have played for England against +Wales." + +"I see at last. What you're trying to tell me is that you were very +good at football." + +Ginger Kemp blushed warmly. + +"Oh, I don't say that. England was pretty short of scrum-halves that +year." + +"What a horrible thing to happen to a country! Still, you were likely to +be picked on the All-England team when the smash came? What was the +smash?" + +"Well, it turned out that the poor old pater hadn't left a penny. I +never understood the process exactly, but I'd always supposed that we +were pretty well off; and then it turned out that I hadn't anything at +all. I'm bound to say it was a bit of a jar. I had to come down from +Cambridge and go to work in my uncle's office. Of course, I made an +absolute hash of it." + +"Why, of course?" + +"Well, I'm not a very clever sort of chap, you see. I somehow didn't +seem able to grasp the workings. After about a year, my uncle, getting a +bit fed-up, hoofed me out and got me a mastership at a school, and I +made a hash of that. He got me one or two other jobs, and I made a hash +of those." + +"You certainly do seem to be one of our most prominent young hashers!" +gasped Sally. + +"I am," said Ginger, modestly. + +There was a silence. + +"And what about Scrymgeour?" Sally asked. + +"That was the last of the jobs," said Ginger. "Scrymgeour is a pompous +old ass who think's he's going to be Prime Minister some day. He's a big +bug at the Bar and has just got into Parliament. My cousin used to devil +for him. That's how I got mixed up with the blighter." + +"Your cousin used... ? I wish you would talk English." + +"That was my cousin who was with me on the beach this morning." + +"And what did you say he used to do for Mr. Scrymgeour?" + +"Oh, it's called devilling. My cousin's at the Bar, too--one of our +rising nibs, as a matter of fact..." + +"I thought he was a lawyer of some kind." + +"He's got a long way beyond it now, but when he started he used to devil +for Scrymgeour--assist him, don't you know. His name's Carmyle, you +know. Perhaps you've heard of him? He's rather a prominent johnny in his +way. Bruce Carmyle, you know." + +"I haven't." + +"Well, he got me this job of secretary to Scrymgeour." + +"And why did Mr. Scrymgeour fire you?" + +Ginger Kemp's face darkened. He frowned. Sally, watching him, felt +that she had been right when she had guessed that he had a temper. She +liked him none the worse for it. Mild men did not appeal to her. + +"I don't know if you're fond of dogs?" said Ginger. + +"I used to be before this morning," said Sally. "And I suppose I shall +be again in time. For the moment I've had what you might call rather a +surfeit of dogs. But aren't you straying from the point? I asked you why +Mr. Scrymgeour dismissed you." + +"I'm telling you." + +"I'm glad of that. I didn't know." + +"The old brute," said Ginger, frowning again, "has a dog. A very jolly +little spaniel. Great pal of mine. And Scrymgeour is the sort of fool +who oughtn't to be allowed to own a dog. He's one of those asses who +isn't fit to own a dog. As a matter of fact, of all the blighted, +pompous, bullying, shrivelled-souled old devils..." + +"One moment," said Sally. "I'm getting an impression that you don't +like Mr. Scrymgeour. Am I right?" + +"Yes!" + +"I thought so. Womanly intuition! Go on." + +"He used to insist on the poor animal doing tricks. I hate seeing a dog +do tricks. Dogs loathe it, you know. They're frightfully sensitive. +Well, Scrymgeour used to make this spaniel of his do tricks--fool-things +that no self-respecting dogs would do: and eventually poor old Billy got +fed up and jibbed. He was too polite to bite, but he sort of shook his +head and crawled under a chair. You'd have thought anyone would have +let it go at that, but would old Scrymgeour? Not a bit of it! Of all the +poisonous..." + +"Yes, I know. Go on." + +"Well, the thing ended in the blighter hauling him out from under the +chair and getting more and more shirty, until finally he laid into him +with a stick. That is to say," said Ginger, coldly accurate, "he started +laying into him with a stick." He brooded for a moment with knit brows. +"A spaniel, mind you! Can you imagine anyone beating a spaniel? It's +like hitting a little girl. Well, he's a fairly oldish man, you know, +and that hampered me a bit: but I got hold of the stick and broke it +into about eleven pieces, and by great good luck it was a stick he +happened to value rather highly. It had a gold knob and had been +presented to him by his constituents or something. I minced it up a +goodish bit, and then I told him a fair amount about himself. And then-- +well, after that he shot me out, and I came here." + +Sally did not speak for a moment. + +"You were quite right," she said at last, in a sober voice that had +nothing in it of her customary flippancy. She paused again. "And what +are you going to do now?" she said. + +"I don't know." + +"You'll get something?" + +"Oh, yes, I shall get something, I suppose. The family will be pretty +sick, of course." + +"For goodness' sake! Why do you bother about the family?" Sally burst +out. She could not reconcile this young man's flabby dependence on his +family with the enterprise and vigour which he had shown in his dealings +with the unspeakable Scrymgeour. Of course, he had been brought up to +look on himself as a rich man's son and appeared to have drifted as such +young men are wont to do; but even so... "The whole trouble with you," +she said, embarking on a subject on which she held strong views, "is +that..." + +Her harangue was interrupted by what--at the Normandie, at one o'clock +in the morning--practically amounted to a miracle. The front door of the +hotel opened, and there entered a young man in evening dress. Such +persons were sufficiently rare at the Normandie, which catered +principally for the staid and middle-aged, and this youth's presence was +due, if one must pause to explain it, to the fact that, in the middle of +his stay at Roville, a disastrous evening at the Casino had so +diminished his funds that he had been obliged to make a hurried shift +from the Hotel Splendide to the humbler Normandie. His late appearance +to-night was caused by the fact that he had been attending a dance at +the Splendide, principally in the hope of finding there some +kind-hearted friend of his prosperity from whom he might borrow. + +A rapid-fire dialogue having taken place between Jules and the newcomer, +the keys were handed through the cage, the door opened and the lift was +set once more in motion. And a few minutes later, Sally, suddenly aware +of an overpowering sleepiness, had switched off her light and jumped +into bed. Her last waking thought was a regret that she had not been +able to speak at length to Mr. Ginger Kemp on the subject of enterprise, +and resolve that the address should be delivered at the earliest +opportunity. + + + + + + + +CHAPTER III + + + +THE DIGNIFIED MR. CARMYLE + + + +1 + + + +By six o'clock on the following evening, however. Sally had been +forced to the conclusion that Ginger would have to struggle through life +as best he could without the assistance of her contemplated remarks: for +she had seen nothing of him all day and in another hour she would have +left Roville on the seven-fifteen express which was to take her to +Paris, en route for Cherbourg and the liner whereon she had booked her +passage for New York. + +It was in the faint hope of finding him even now that, at half-past six, +having conveyed her baggage to the station and left it in charge of an +amiable porter, she paid a last visit to the Casino Municipale. She +disliked the thought of leaving Ginger without having uplifted him. Like +so many alert and active-minded girls, she possessed in a great degree +the quality of interesting herself in--or, as her brother Fillmore +preferred to put it, messing about with--the private affairs of others. +Ginger had impressed her as a man to whom it was worth while to give a +friendly shove on the right path; and it was with much gratification, +therefore, that, having entered the Casino, she perceived a flaming head +shining through the crowd which had gathered at one of the +roulette-tables. + +There are two Casinos at Roville-sur-Mer. The one on the Promenade goes +in mostly for sea-air and a mild game called boule. It is the big Casino +Municipale down in the Palace Massena near the railway station which is +the haunt of the earnest gambler who means business; and it was plain to +Sally directly she arrived that Ginger Kemp not only meant business but +was getting results. Ginger was going extremely strong. He was +entrenched behind an opulent-looking mound of square counters: and, even +as Sally looked, a wooden-faced croupier shoved a further instalment +across the table to him at the end of his long rake. + +"Epatant!" murmured a wistful man at Sally's side, removing an elbow +from her ribs in order the better to gesticulate Sally, though no French +scholar, gathered that he was startled and gratified. The entire crowd +seemed to be startled and gratified. There is undoubtedly a certain +altruism in the make-up of the spectators at a Continental +roulette-table. They seem to derive a spiritual pleasure from seeing +somebody else win. + +The croupier gave his moustache a twist with his left hand and the wheel +a twist with his right, and silence fell again. Sally, who had shifted +to a spot where the pressure of the crowd was less acute, was now able +to see Ginger's face, and as she saw it she gave an involuntary laugh. +He looked exactly like a dog at a rat-hole. His hair seemed to bristle +with excitement. One could almost fancy that his ears were pricked up. + +In the tense hush which had fallen on the crowd at the restarting of the +wheel, Sally's laugh rang out with an embarrassing clearness. It had a +marked effect on all those within hearing. There is something almost of +religious ecstasy in the deportment of the spectators at a table where +anyone is having a run of luck at roulette, and if she had guffawed in a +cathedral she could not have caused a more pained consternation. The +earnest worshippers gazed at her with shocked eyes, and Ginger, turning +with a start, saw her and jumped up. As he did so, the ball fell with a +rattling click into a red compartment of the wheel; and, as it ceased to +revolve and it was seen that at last the big winner had picked the wrong +colour, a shuddering groan ran through the congregation like that which +convulses the penitents' bench at a negro revival meeting. More glances +of reproach were cast at Sally. It was generally felt that her +injudicious behaviour had changed Ginger's luck. + +The only person who did not appear to be concerned was Ginger himself. +He gathered up his loot, thrust it into his pocket, and elbowed his way +to where Sally stood, now definitely established in the eyes of the +crowd as a pariah. There was universal regret that he had decided to +call it a day. It was to the spectators as though a star had suddenly +walked off the stage in the middle of his big scene; and not even a loud +and violent quarrel which sprang up at this moment between two excitable +gamblers over a disputed five-franc counter could wholly console them. + +"I say," said Ginger, dexterously plucking Sally out of the crowd, "this +is topping, meeting you like this. I've been looking for you +everywhere." + +"It's funny you didn't find me, then, for that's where I've been. I was +looking for you." + +"No, really?" Ginger seemed pleased. He led the way to the quiet +ante-room outside the gambling-hall, and they sat down in a corner. It +was pleasant here, with nobody near except the gorgeously uniformed +attendant over by the door. "That was awfully good of you." + +"I felt I must have a talk with you before my train went." + +Ginger started violently. + +"Your train? What do you mean?" + +"The puff-puff," explained Sally. "I'm leaving to-night, you know." + +"Leaving?" Ginger looked as horrified as the devoutest of the +congregation of which Sally had just ceased to be a member. "You don't +mean leaving? You're not going away from Roville?" + +"I'm afraid so." + +"But why? Where are you going?" + +"Back to America. My boat sails from Cherbourg tomorrow." + +"Oh, my aunt!" + +"I'm sorry," said Sally, touched by his concern. She was a warm-hearted +girl and liked being appreciated. "But..." + +"I say..." Ginger Kemp turned bright scarlet and glared before him at +the uniformed official, who was regarding their tête-à-tête with the +indulgent eye of one who has been through this sort of thing himself. "I +say, look here, will you marry me?" + + + +2 + + + +Sally stared at his vermilion profile in frank amazement. Ginger, she +had realized by this time, was in many ways a surprising young man, but +she had not expected him to be as surprising as this. + +"Marry you!" + +"You know what I mean." + +"Well, yes, I suppose I do. You allude to the holy state. Yes, I know +what you mean." + +"Then how about it?" + +Sally began to regain her composure. Her sense of humour was tickled. +She looked at Ginger gravely. He did not meet her eye, but continued to +drink in the uniformed official, who was by now so carried away by the +romance of it all that he had begun to hum a love-ballad under his +breath. The official could not hear what they were saying, and would not +have been able to understand it even if he could have heard; but he was +an expert in the language of the eyes. + +"But isn't this--don't think I am trying to make difficulties--isn't +this a little sudden?" + +"It's got to be sudden," said Ginger Kemp, complainingly. "I thought +you were going to be here for weeks." + +"But, my infant, my babe, has it occurred to you that we are practically +strangers?" She patted his hand tolerantly, causing the uniformed +official to heave a tender sigh. "I see what has happened," she said. +"You're mistaking me for some other girl, some girl you know really +well, and were properly introduced to. Take a good look at me, and +you'll see." + +"If I take a good look at you," said Ginger, feverishly, "I'm dashed if +I'll answer for the consequences." + +"And this is the man I was going to lecture on 'Enterprise.'" + +"You're the most wonderful girl I've ever met, dash it!" said Ginger, +his gaze still riveted on the official by the door "I dare say it is +sudden. I can't help that. I fell in love with you the moment I saw you, +and there you are!" + +"But..." + +"Now, look here, I know I'm not much of a chap and all that, but... +well, I've just won the deuce of a lot of money in there..." + +"Would you buy me with your gold?" + +"I mean to say, we should have enough to start on, and... of course I've +made an infernal hash of everything I've tried up till now, but there +must be something I can do, and you can jolly well bet I'd have a +goodish stab at it. I mean to say, with you to buck me up and so forth, +don't you know. Well, I mean..." + +"Has it struck you that I may already be engaged to someone else?" + +"Oh, golly! Are you?" + +For the first time he turned and faced her, and there was a look in his +eyes which touched Sally and drove all sense of the ludicrous out of +her. Absurd as it was, this man was really serious. + +"Well, yes, as a matter of fact I am," she said soberly. + +Ginger Kemp bit his lip and for a moment was silent. + +"Oh, well, that's torn it!" he said at last. + +Sally was aware of an emotion too complex to analyse. There was pity in +it, but amusement too. The emotion, though she did not recognize it, was +maternal. Mothers, listening to their children pleading with engaging +absurdity for something wholly out of their power to bestow, feel that +same wavering between tears and laughter. Sally wanted to pick Ginger up +and kiss him. The one thing she could not do was to look on him, sorry +as she was for him, as a reasonable, grown-up man. + +"You don't really mean it, you know." + +"Don't I!" said Ginger, hollowly. "Oh, don't I!" + +"You can't! There isn't such a thing in real life as love at first +sight. Love's a thing that comes when you know a person well and..." She +paused. It had just occurred to her that she was hardly the girl to +lecture in this strain. Her love for Gerald Foster had been sufficiently +sudden, even instantaneous. What did she know of Gerald except that she +loved him? They had become engaged within two weeks of their first +meeting. She found this recollection damping to her eloquence, and ended +by saying tamely: + +"It's ridiculous." + +Ginger had simmered down to a mood of melancholy resignation. + +"I couldn't have expected you to care for me, I suppose, anyway," he +said, sombrely. "I'm not much of a chap." + +It was just the diversion from the theme under discussion which Sally +had been longing to find. She welcomed the chance of continuing the +conversation on a less intimate and sentimental note. + +"That's exactly what I wanted to talk to you about," she said, seizing +the opportunity offered by this display of humility. "I've been looking +for you all day to go on with what I was starting to say in the lift +last night when we were interrupted. Do you mind if I talk to you like +an aunt--or a sister, suppose we say? Really, the best plan would be for +you to adopt me as an honorary sister. What do you think?" + +Ginger did not appear noticeably elated at the suggested relationship. + +"Because I really do take a tremendous interest in you." + +Ginger brightened. "That's awfully good of you." + +"I'm going to speak words of wisdom. Ginger, why don't you brace up?" + +"Brace up?" + +"Yes, stiffen your backbone and stick out your chin, and square your +elbows, and really amount to something. Why do you simply flop about and +do nothing and leave everything to what you call 'the family'? Why do +you have to be helped all the time? Why don't you help yourself? Why do +you have to have jobs found for you? Why don't you rush out and get one? +Why do you have to worry about what, 'the family' thinks of you? Why +don't you make yourself independent of them? I know you had hard luck, +suddenly finding yourself without money and all that, but, good heavens, +everybody else in the world who has ever done anything has been broke at +one time or another. It's part of the fun. You'll never get anywhere by +letting yourself be picked up by the family like... like a floppy +Newfoundland puppy and dumped down in any old place that happens to suit +them. A job's a thing you've got to choose for yourself and get for +yourself. Think what you can do--there must be something--and then go at +it with a snort and grab it and hold it down and teach it to take a +joke. You've managed to collect some money. It will give you time to +look round. And, when you've had a look round, do something! Try to +realize you're alive, and try to imagine the family isn't!" + +Sally stopped and drew a deep breath. Ginger Kemp did not reply for a +moment. He seemed greatly impressed. + +"When you talk quick," he said at length, in a serious meditative voice, +"your nose sort of goes all squiggly. Ripping, it looks!" + +Sally uttered an indignant cry. + +"Do you mean to say you haven't been listening to a word I've been +saying," she demanded. + +"Oh, rather! Oh, by Jove, yes." + +"Well, what did I say?" + +"You... er... And your eyes sort of shine, too." + +"Never mind my eyes. What did I say?" + +"You told me," said Ginger, on reflection, "to get a job." + +"Well, yes. I put it much better than that, but that's what it amounted +to, I suppose. All right, then. I'm glad you..." + +Ginger was eyeing her with mournful devotion. "I say," he interrupted, +"I wish you'd let me write to you. Letters, I mean, and all that. I have +an idea it would kind of buck me up." + +"You won't have time for writing letters." + +"I'll have time to write them to you. You haven't an address or +anything of that sort in America, have you, by any chance? I mean, so +that I'd know where to write to." + +"I can give you an address which will always find me." She told him the +number and street of Mrs. Meecher's boarding-house, and he wrote them +down reverently on his shirt-cuff. "Yes, on second thoughts, do write," +she said. "Of course, I shall want to know how you've got on. I... oh, +my goodness! That clock's not right?" + +"Just about. What time does your train go?" + +"Go! It's gone! Or, at least, it goes in about two seconds." She made a +rush for the swing-door, to the confusion of the uniformed official who +had not been expecting this sudden activity. "Good-bye, Ginger. Write to +me, and remember what I said." + +Ginger, alert after his unexpected fashion when it became a question of +physical action, had followed her through the swing-door, and they +emerged together and started running down the square. + +"Stick it!" said Ginger, encouragingly. He was running easily and well, +as becomes a man who, in his day, had been a snip for his international +at scrum-half. + +Sally saved her breath. The train was beginning to move slowly out of +the station as they sprinted abreast on to the platform. Ginger dived +for the nearest door, wrenched it open, gathered Sally neatly in his +arms, and flung her in. She landed squarely on the toes of a man who +occupied the corner seat, and, bounding off again, made for the window. +Ginger, faithful to the last, was trotting beside the train as it +gathered speed. + +"Ginger! My poor porter! Tip him. I forgot." + +"Right ho!" + +"And don't forget what I've been saying." + +"Right ho!" + +"Look after yourself and 'Death to the Family!'" + +"Right ho!" + +The train passed smoothly out of the station. Sally cast one last look +back at her red-haired friend, who had now halted and was waving a +handkerchief. Then she turned to apologize to the other occupant of the +carriage. + +"I'm so sorry," she said, breathlessly. "I hope I didn't hurt you." + +She found herself facing Ginger's cousin, the dark man of yesterday's +episode on the beach, Bruce Carmyle. + + + +3 + + + +Mr. Carmyle was not a man who readily allowed himself to be disturbed by +life's little surprises, but at the present moment he could not help +feeling slightly dazed. He recognized Sally now as the French girl who +had attracted his cousin Lancelot's notice on the beach. At least he had +assumed that she was French, and it was startling to be addressed by her +now in fluent English. How had she suddenly acquired this gift of +tongues? And how on earth had she had time since yesterday, when he had +been a total stranger to her, to become sufficiently intimate with +Cousin Lancelot to be sprinting with him down station platforms and +addressing him out of railway-carriage windows as Ginger? Bruce Carmyle +was aware that most members of that sub-species of humanity, his +cousin's personal friends, called him by that familiar--and, so Carmyle +held, vulgar--nickname: but how had this girl got hold of it? + +If Sally had been less pretty, Mr. Carmyle would undoubtedly have +looked disapprovingly at her, for she had given his rather rigid sense +of the proprieties a nasty jar. But as, panting and flushed from her +run, she was prettier than any girl he had yet met, he contrived to +smile. + +"Not at all," he said in answer to her question, though it was far from +the truth. His left big toe was aching confoundedly. Even a girl with a +foot as small as Sally's can make her presence felt on a man's toe if +the scrum-half who is handling her aims well and uses plenty of vigour. + +"If you don't mind," said Sally, sitting down, "I think I'll breathe a +little." + +She breathed. The train sped on. + +"Quite a close thing," said Bruce Carmyle, affably. The pain in his toe +was diminishing. "You nearly missed it." + +"Yes. It was lucky Mr. Kemp was with me. He throws very straight, +doesn't he." + +"Tell me," said Carmyle, "how do you come to know my Cousin? On the +beach yesterday morning..." + +"Oh, we didn't know each other then. But we were staying at the same +hotel, and we spent an hour or so shut up in an elevator together. That +was when we really got acquainted." + +A waiter entered the compartment, announcing in unexpected English that +dinner was served in the restaurant car. "Would you care for dinner?" + +"I'm starving," said Sally. + +She reproved herself, as they made their way down the corridor, for +being so foolish as to judge anyone by his appearance. This man was +perfectly pleasant in spite of his grim exterior. She had decided by the +time they had seated themselves at the table she liked him. + +At the table, however, Mr. Carmyle's manner changed for the worse. He +lost his amiability. He was evidently a man who took his meals seriously +and believed in treating waiters with severity. He shuddered austerely +at a stain on the table-cloth, and then concentrated himself frowningly +on the bill of fare. Sally, meanwhile, was establishing cosy relations +with the much too friendly waiter, a cheerful old man who from the start +seemed to have made up his mind to regard her as a favourite daughter. +The waiter talked no English and Sally no French, but they were getting +along capitally, when Mr. Carmyle, who had been irritably waving aside +the servitor's light-hearted advice--at the Hotel Splendide the waiters +never bent over you and breathed cordial suggestions down the side of +your face--gave his order crisply in the Anglo-Gallic dialect of the +travelling Briton. The waiter remarked, "Boum!" in a pleased sort of +way, and vanished. + +"Nice old man!" said Sally. + +"Infernally familiar!" said Mr. Carmyle. + +Sally perceived that on the topic of the waiter she and her host did not +see eye to eye and that little pleasure or profit could be derived from +any discussion centring about him. She changed the subject. She was not +liking Mr. Carmyle quite so much as she had done a few minutes ago, but +it was courteous of him to give her dinner, and she tried to like him as +much as she could. + +"By the way," she said, "my name is Nicholas. I always think it's a +good thing to start with names, don't you?" + +"Mine..." + +"Oh, I know yours. Ginger--Mr. Kemp told me." + +Mr. Carmyle, who since the waiter's departure, had been thawing, +stiffened again at the mention of Ginger. + +"Indeed?" he said, coldly. "Apparently you got intimate." + +Sally did not like his tone. He seemed to be criticizing her, and she +resented criticism from a stranger. Her eyes opened wide and she looked +dangerously across the table. + +"Why 'apparently'? I told you that we had got intimate, and I explained +how. You can't stay shut up in an elevator half the night with anybody +without getting to know him. I found Mr. Kemp very pleasant." + +"Really?" + +"And very interesting." + +Mr. Carmyle raised his eyebrows. + +"Would you call him interesting?" + +"I did call him interesting." Sally was beginning to feel the +exhilaration of battle. Men usually made themselves extremely agreeable +to her, and she reacted belligerently under the stiff unfriendliness +which had come over her companion in the last few minutes. + +"He told me all about himself." + +"And you found that interesting?" + +"Why not?" + +"Well..." A frigid half-smile came and went on Bruce Carmyle's dark +face. "My cousin has many excellent qualities, no doubt--he used to play +football well, and I understand that he is a capable amateur +pugilist--but I should not have supposed him entertaining. We find him a +little dull." + +"I thought it was only royalty that called themselves 'we.'" + +"I meant myself--and the rest of the family." + +The mention of the family was too much for Sally. She had to stop +talking in order to allow her mind to clear itself of rude thoughts. + +"Mr. Kemp was telling me about Mr. Scrymgeour," she went on at length. + +Bruce Carmyle stared for a moment at the yard or so of French bread +which the waiter had placed on the table. + +"Indeed?" he said. "He has an engaging lack of reticence." + +The waiter returned bearing soup and dumped it down. + +"V'la!" he observed, with the satisfied air of a man who has +successfully performed a difficult conjuring trick. He smiled at Sally +expectantly, as though confident of applause from this section of his +audience at least. But Sally's face was set and rigid. She had been +snubbed, and the sensation was as pleasant as it was novel. + +"I think Mr. Kemp had hard luck," she said. + +"If you will excuse me, I would prefer not to discuss the matter." + +Mr. Carmyle's attitude was that Sally might be a pretty girl, but she +was a stranger, and the intimate affairs of the Family were not to be +discussed with strangers, however prepossessing. + +"He was quite in the right. Mr. Scrymgeour was beating a dog..." + +"I've heard the details." + +"Oh, I didn't know that. Well, don't you agree with me, then?" + +"I do not. A man who would throw away an excellent position simply +because..." + +"Oh, well, if that's your view, I suppose it is useless to talk about +it." + +"Quite." + +"Still, there's no harm in asking what you propose to do about +Gin--about Mr. Kemp." + +Mr. Carmyle became more glacial. + +"I'm afraid I cannot discuss..." + +Sally's quick impatience, nobly restrained till now, finally got the +better of her. + +"Oh, for goodness' sake," she snapped, "do try to be human, and don't +always be snubbing people. You remind me of one of those portraits of +men in the eighteenth century, with wooden faces, who look out of heavy +gold frames at you with fishy eyes as if you were a regrettable +incident." + +"Rosbif," said the waiter genially, manifesting himself suddenly beside +them as if he had popped up out of a trap. + +Bruce Carmyle attacked his roast beef morosely. Sally who was in the +mood when she knew that she would be ashamed of herself later on, but +was full of battle at the moment, sat in silence. + +"I am sorry," said Mr. Carmyle ponderously, "if my eyes are fishy. The +fact has not been called to my attention before." + +"I suppose you never had any sisters," said Sally. "They would have +told you." + +Mr. Carmyle relapsed into an offended dumbness, which lasted till the +waiter had brought the coffee. + +"I think," said Sally, getting up, "I'll be going now. I don't seem to +want any coffee, and, if I stay on, I may say something rude. I thought +I might be able to put in a good word for Mr. Kemp and save him from +being massacred, but apparently it's no use. Good-bye, Mr. Carmyle, and +thank you for giving me dinner." + +She made her way down the car, followed by Bruce Carmyle's indignant, +yet fascinated, gaze. Strange emotions were stirring in Mr. Carmyle's +bosom. + + + + + + + +CHAPTER IV + + + +GINGER IN DANGEROUS MOOD + + + +Some few days later, owing to the fact that the latter, being +preoccupied, did not see him first, Bruce Carmyle met his cousin +Lancelot in Piccadilly. They had returned by different routes from +Roville, and Ginger would have preferred the separation to continue. He +was hurrying on with a nod, when Carmyle stopped him. + +"Just the man I wanted to see," he observed. + +"Oh, hullo!" said Ginger, without joy. + +"I was thinking of calling at your club." + +"Yes?" + +"Yes. Cigarette?" + +Ginger peered at the proffered case with the vague suspicion of the man +who has allowed himself to be lured on to the platform and is accepting +a card from the conjurer. He felt bewildered. In all the years of their +acquaintance he could not recall another such exhibition of geniality on +his cousin's part. He was surprised, indeed, at Mr. Carmyle's speaking +to him at all, for the affaire Scrymgeour remained an un-healed wound, +and the Family, Ginger knew, were even now in session upon it. + +"Been back in London long?" + +"Day or two." + +"I heard quite by accident that you had returned and that you were +staying at the club. By the way, thank you for introducing me to Miss +Nicholas." + +Ginger started violently. + +"What!" + +"I was in that compartment, you know, at Roville Station. You threw her +right on top of me. We agreed to consider that an introduction. An +attractive girl." + +Bruce Carmyle had not entirely made up his mind regarding Sally, but on +one point he was clear, that she should not, if he could help it, pass +out of his life. Her abrupt departure had left him with that baffled and +dissatisfied feeling which, though it has little in common with love at +first sight, frequently produces the same effects. She had had, he +could not disguise it from himself, the better of their late encounter +and he was conscious of a desire to meet her again and show her that +there was more in him than she apparently supposed. Bruce Carmyle, in a +word, was piqued: and, though he could not quite decide whether he liked +or disliked Sally, he was very sure that a future without her would have +an element of flatness. + +"A very attractive girl. We had a very pleasant talk." + +"I bet you did," said Ginger enviously. + +"By the way, she did not give you her address by any chance?" + +"Why?" said Ginger suspiciously. His attitude towards Sally's address +resembled somewhat that of a connoisseur who has acquired a unique work +of art. He wanted to keep it to himself and gloat over it. + +"Well, I--er--I promised to send her some books she was anxious to +read..." + +"I shouldn't think she gets much time for reading." + +"Books which are not published in America." + +"Oh, pretty nearly everything is published in America, what? Bound to +be, I mean." + +"Well, these particular books are not," said Mr. Carmyle shortly. He +was finding Ginger's reserve a little trying, and wished that he had +been more inventive. + +"Give them to me and I'll send them to her," suggested Ginger. + +"Good Lord, man!" snapped Mr. Carmyle. "I'm capable of sending a few +books to America. Where does she live?" + +Ginger revealed the sacred number of the holy street which had the luck +to be Sally's headquarters. He did it because with a persistent devil +like his cousin there seemed no way of getting out of it: but he did it +grudgingly. + +"Thanks." Bruce Carmyle wrote the information down with a gold pencil in +a dapper little morocco-bound note-book. He was the sort of man who +always has a pencil, and the backs of old envelopes never enter into his +life. + +There was a pause. Bruce Carmyle coughed. + +"I saw Uncle Donald this morning," he said. + +His manner had lost its geniality. There was no need for it now, and he +was a man who objected to waste. He spoke coldly, and in his voice there +was a familiar sub-tingle of reproof. + +"Yes?" said Ginger moodily. This was the uncle in whose office he had +made his debut as a hasher: a worthy man, highly respected in the +National Liberal Club, but never a favourite of Ginger's. There were +other minor uncles and a few subsidiary aunts who went to make up the +Family, but Uncle Donald was unquestionably the managing director of +that body and it was Ginger's considered opinion that in this capacity +he approximated to a human blister. + +"He wants you to dine with him to-night at Bleke's." + +Ginger's depression deepened. A dinner with Uncle Donald would hardly +have been a cheerful function, even in the surroundings of a banquet in +the Arabian Nights. There was that about Uncle Donald's personality +which would have cast a sobering influence over the orgies of the +Emperor Tiberius at Capri. To dine with him at a morgue like that relic +of Old London, Bleke's Coffee House, which confined its custom +principally to regular patrons who had not missed an evening there for +half a century, was to touch something very near bed-rock. Ginger was +extremely doubtful whether flesh and blood were equal to it. + +"To-night?" he said. "Oh, you mean to-night? Well..." + +"Don't be a fool. You know as well as I do that you've got to go." +Uncle Donald's invitations were royal commands in the Family. "If +you've another engagement you must put it off." + +"Oh, all right." + +"Seven-thirty sharp." + +"All right," said Ginger gloomily. + +The two men went their ways, Bruce Carmyle eastwards because he had +clients to see in his chambers at the Temple; Ginger westwards because +Mr. Carmyle had gone east. There was little sympathy between these +cousins: yet, oddly enough, their thoughts as they walked centred on the +same object. Bruce Carmyle, threading his way briskly through the crowds +of Piccadilly Circus, was thinking of Sally: and so was Ginger as he +loafed aimlessly towards Hyde Park Corner, bumping in a sort of coma +from pedestrian to pedestrian. + +Since his return to London Ginger had been in bad shape. He mooned +through the days and slept poorly at night. If there is one thing +rottener than another in a pretty blighted world, one thing which gives +a fellow the pip and reduces him to the condition of an absolute onion, +it is hopeless love. Hopeless love had got Ginger all stirred up. His +had been hitherto a placid soul. Even the financial crash which had so +altered his life had not bruised him very deeply. His temperament had +enabled him to bear the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune with a +philosophic "Right ho!" But now everything seemed different. Things +irritated him acutely, which before he had accepted as inevitable--his +Uncle Donald's moustache, for instance, and its owner's habit of +employing it during meals as a sort of zareba or earthwork against the +assaults of soup. + +"By gad!" thought Ginger, stopping suddenly opposite Devonshire House. +"If he uses that damned shrubbery as soup-strainer to-night, I'll slosh +him with a fork!" + +Hard thoughts... hard thoughts! And getting harder all the time, for +nothing grows more quickly than a mood of rebellion. Rebellion is a +forest fire that flames across the soul. The spark had been lighted in +Ginger, and long before he reached Hyde Park Corner he was ablaze and +crackling. By the time he returned to his club he was practically a +menace to society--to that section of it, at any rate, which embraced +his Uncle Donald, his minor uncles George and William, and his aunts +Mary, Geraldine, and Louise. + +Nor had the mood passed when he began to dress for the dismal +festivities of Bleke's Coffee House. He scowled as he struggled morosely +with an obstinate tie. One cannot disguise the fact--Ginger was warming +up. And it was just at this moment that Fate, as though it had been +waiting for the psychological instant, applied the finishing touch. +There was a knock at the door, and a waiter came in with a telegram. + +Ginger looked at the envelope. It had been readdressed and forwarded on +from the Hotel Normandie. It was a wireless, handed in on board the +White Star liner Olympic, and it ran as follows: + +Remember. Death to the Family. S. + +Ginger sat down heavily on the bed. + +The driver of the taxi-cab which at twenty-five minutes past seven drew +up at the dingy door of Bleke's Coffee House in the Strand was rather +struck by his fare's manner and appearance. A determined-looking sort of +young bloke, was the taxi-driver's verdict. + + + + + + + +CHAPTER V + + + +SALLY HEARS NEWS + + + +It had been Sally's intention, on arriving in New York, to take a room +at the St. Regis and revel in the gilded luxury to which her wealth +entitled her before moving into the small but comfortable apartment +which, as soon as she had the time, she intended to find and make her +permanent abode. But when the moment came and she was giving directions +to the taxi-driver at the dock, there seemed to her something +revoltingly Fillmorian about the scheme. It would be time enough to +sever herself from the boarding-house which had been her home for three +years when she had found the apartment. Meanwhile, the decent thing to +do, if she did not want to brand herself in the sight of her conscience +as a female Fillmore, was to go back temporarily to Mrs. Meecher's +admirable establishment and foregather with her old friends. After all, +home is where the heart is, even if there are more prunes there than the +gourmet would consider judicious. + +Perhaps it was the unavoidable complacency induced by the thought that +she was doing the right thing, or possibly it was the tingling +expectation of meeting Gerald Foster again after all these weeks of +separation, that made the familiar streets seem wonderfully bright as +she drove through them. It was a perfect, crisp New York morning, all +blue sky and amber sunshine, and even the ash-cans had a stimulating +look about them. The street cars were full of happy people rollicking +off to work: policemen directed the traffic with jaunty affability: and +the white-clad street-cleaners went about their poetic tasks with a +quiet but none the less noticeable relish. It was improbable that any of +these people knew that she was back, but somehow they all seemed to be +behaving as though this were a special day. + +The first discordant note in this overture of happiness was struck by +Mrs. Meecher, who informed Sally, after expressing her gratification at +the news that she required her old room, that Gerald Foster had left +town that morning. + +"Gone to Detroit, he has," said Mrs. Meecher. "Miss Doland, too." She +broke off to speak a caustic word to the boarding-house handyman, who, +with Sally's trunk as a weapon, was depreciating the value of the +wall-paper in the hall. "There's that play of his being tried out there, +you know, Monday," resumed Mrs. Meecher, after the handyman had bumped +his way up the staircase. "They been rehearsing ever since you left." + +Sally was disappointed, but it was such a beautiful morning, and New +York was so wonderful after the dull voyage in the liner that she was +not going to allow herself to be depressed without good reason. After +all, she could go on to Detroit tomorrow. It was nice to have something +to which she could look forward. + +"Oh, is Elsa in the company?" she said. + +"Sure. And very good too, I hear." Mrs. Meecher kept abreast of +theatrical gossip. She was an ex-member of the profession herself, +having been in the first production of "Florodora," though, unlike +everybody else, not one of the original Sextette. "Mr. Faucitt was down +to see a rehearsal, and he said Miss Doland was fine. And he's not easy +to please, as you know." + +"How is Mr. Faucitt?" + +Mrs. Meecher, not unwillingly, for she was a woman who enjoyed the +tragedies of life, made her second essay in the direction of lowering +Sally's uplifted mood. + +"Poor old gentleman, he ain't over and above well. Went to bed early +last night with a headache, and this morning I been to see him and he +don't look well. There's a lot of this Spanish influenza about. It might +be that. Lots o' people have been dying of it, if you believe what you +see in the papers," said Mrs. Meecher buoyantly. + +"Good gracious! You don't think... ?" + +"Well, he ain't turned black," admitted Mrs. Meecher with regret. "They +say they turn black. If you believe what you see in the papers, that is. +Of course, that may come later," she added with the air of one confident +that all will come right in the future. "The doctor'll be in to see him +pretty soon. He's quite happy. Toto's sitting with him." + +Sally's concern increased. Like everyone who had ever spent any length +of time in the house, she had strong views on Toto. This quadruped, who +stained the fame of the entire canine race by posing as a dog, was a +small woolly animal with a persistent and penetrating yap, hard to bear +with equanimity in health and certainly quite outside the range of a +sick man. Her heart bled for Mr. Faucitt. Mrs. Meecher, on the other +hand, who held a faith in her little pet's amiability and power to +soothe which seven years' close association had been unable to shake, +seemed to feel that, with Toto on the spot, all that could be done had +been done as far as pampering the invalid was concerned. + +"I must go up and see him," cried Sally. "Poor old dear." + +"Sure. You know his room. You can hear Toto talking to him now," said +Mrs. Meecher complacently. "He wants a cracker, that's what he wants. +Toto likes a cracker after breakfast." + +The invalid's eyes, as Sally entered the room, turned wearily to the +door. At the sight of Sally they lit up with an incredulous rapture. +Almost any intervention would have pleased Mr. Faucitt at that moment, +for his little playmate had long outstayed any welcome that might +originally have been his: but that the caller should be his beloved +Sally seemed to the old man something in the nature of a return of the +age of miracles. + +"Sally!" + +"One moment. Here, Toto!" + +Toto, struck momentarily dumb by the sight of food, had jumped off the +bed and was standing with his head on one side, peering questioningly at +the cracker. He was a suspicious dog, but he allowed himself to be lured +into the passage, upon which Sally threw the cracker down and slipped in +and shut the door. Toto, after a couple of yaps, which may have been +gratitude or baffled fury, trotted off downstairs, and Mr. Faucitt drew +a deep breath. + +"Sally, you come, as ever, as an angel of mercy. Our worthy Mrs. +Meecher means well, and I yield to no man in my respect for her innate +kindness of heart: but she errs in supposing that that thrice-damned +whelp of hers is a combination of sick-nurse, soothing medicine, and a +week at the seaside. She insisted on bringing him here. He was yapping +then, as he was yapping when, with womanly resource which I cannot +sufficiently praise, you decoyed him hence. And each yap went through me +like hammer-strokes on sheeted tin. Sally, you stand alone among +womankind. You shine like a good deed in a naughty world. When did you +get back?" + +"I've only just arrived in my hired barouche from the pier." + +"And you came to see your old friend without delay? I am grateful and +flattered. Sally, my dear." + +"Of course I came to see you. Do you suppose that, when Mrs. Meecher +told me you were sick, I just said 'Is that so?' and went on talking +about the weather? Well, what do you mean by it? Frightening everybody. +Poor old darling, do you feel very bad?" + +"One thousand individual mice are nibbling the base of my spine, and I +am conscious of a constant need of cooling refreshment. But what of +that? Your presence is a tonic. Tell me, how did our Sally enjoy foreign +travel?" + +"Our Sally had the time of her life." + +"Did you visit England?" + +"Only passing through." + +"How did it look?" asked Mr. Faucitt eagerly. + +"Moist. Very moist." + +"It would," said Mr. Faucitt indulgently. "I confess that, happy as I +have been in this country, there are times when I miss those wonderful +London days, when a sort of cosy brown mist hangs over the streets and +the pavements ooze with a perspiration of mud and water, and you see +through the haze the yellow glow of the Bodega lamps shining in the +distance like harbour-lights. Not," said Mr. Faucitt, "that I specify +the Bodega to the exclusion of other and equally worthy hostelries. I +have passed just as pleasant hours in Rule's and Short's. You missed +something by not lingering in England, Sally." + +"I know I did--pneumonia." + +Mr. Faucitt shook his head reproachfully. + +"You are prejudiced, my dear. You would have enjoyed London if you had +had the courage to brave its superficial gloom. Where did you spend your +holiday? Paris?" + +"Part of the time. And the rest of the while I was down by the sea. It +was glorious. I don't think I would ever have come back if I hadn't had +to. But, of course, I wanted to see you all again. And I wanted to be at +the opening of Mr. Foster's play. Mrs. Meecher tells me you went to one +of the rehearsals." + +"I attended a dog-fight which I was informed was a rehearsal," said Mr. +Faucitt severely. "There is no rehearsing nowadays." + +"Oh dear! Was it as bad as all that?" + +"The play is good. The play--I will go further--is excellent. It has +fat. But the acting..." + +"Mrs. Meecher said you told her that Elsa was good." + +"Our worthy hostess did not misreport me. Miss Doland has great +possibilities. She reminds me somewhat of Matilda Devine, under whose +banner I played a season at the Old Royalty in London many years ago. +She has the seeds of greatness in her, but she is wasted in the present +case on an insignificant part. There is only one part in the play. I +allude to the one murdered by Miss Mabel Hobson." + +"Murdered!" Sally's heart sank. She had been afraid of this, and it was +no satisfaction to feel that she had warned Gerald. "Is she very +terrible?" + +"She has the face of an angel and the histrionic ability of that curious +suet pudding which our estimable Mrs. Meecher is apt to give us on +Fridays. In my professional career I have seen many cases of what I may +term the Lady Friend in the role of star, but Miss Hobson eclipses them +all. I remember in the year '94 a certain scion of the plutocracy took +it into his head to present a female for whom he had conceived an +admiration in a part which would have taxed the resources of the ablest. +I was engaged in her support, and at the first rehearsal I recollect +saying to my dear old friend, Arthur Moseby--dead, alas, these many +years. An excellent juvenile, but, like so many good fellows, cursed +with a tendency to lift the elbow--I recollect saying to him 'Arthur, +dear boy, I give it two weeks.' 'Max,' was his reply, 'you are an +incurable optimist. One consecutive night, laddie, one consecutive +night.' We had, I recall, an even half-crown upon it. He won. We opened +at Wigan, our leading lady got the bird, and the show closed next day. I +was forcibly reminded of this incident as I watched Miss Hobson +rehearsing." + +"Oh, poor Ger--poor Mr. Foster!" + +"I do not share your commiseration for that young man," said Mr. Faucitt +austerely. "You probably are almost a stranger to him, but he and I have +been thrown together a good deal of late. A young man upon whom, mark my +words, success, if it ever comes, will have the worst effects. I dislike +him. Sally. He is, I think, without exception, the most selfish and +self-centred young man of my acquaintance. He reminds me very much of +old Billy Fothergill, with whom I toured a good deal in the later +eighties. Did I ever tell you the story of Billy and the amateur who...?" + +Sally was in no mood to listen to the adventures of Mr. Fothergill. The +old man's innocent criticism of Gerald had stabbed her deeply. A +momentary impulse to speak hotly in his defence died away as she saw Mr. +Faucitt's pale, worn old face. He had meant no harm, after all. How +could he know what Gerald was to her? + +She changed the conversation abruptly. + +"Have you seen anything of Fillmore while I've been away?" + +"Fillmore? Why yes, my dear, curiously enough I happened to run into him +on Broadway only a few days ago. He seemed changed--less stiff and aloof +than he had been for some time past. I may be wronging him, but there +have been times of late when one might almost have fancied him a trifle +up-stage. All that was gone at our last encounter. He appeared glad to +see me and was most cordial." + +Sally found her composure restored. Her lecture on the night of the +party had evidently, she thought, not been wasted. Mr. Faucitt, however, +advanced another theory to account for the change in the Man of Destiny. + +"I rather fancy," he said, "that the softening influence has been the +young man's fiancée." + +"What? Fillmore's not engaged?" + +"Did he not write and tell you? I suppose he was waiting to inform you +when you returned. Yes, Fillmore is betrothed. The lady was with him +when we met. A Miss Winch. In the profession, I understand. He +introduced me. A very charming and sensible young lady, I thought." + +Sally shook her head. + +"She can't be. Fillmore would never have got engaged to anyone like +that. Was her hair crimson?" + +"Brown, if I recollect rightly." + +"Very loud, I suppose, and overdressed?" + +"On the contrary, neat and quiet." + +"You've made a mistake," said Sally decidedly. "She can't have been +like that. I shall have to look into this. It does seem hard that I +can't go away for a few weeks without all my friends taking to beds of +sickness and all my brothers getting ensnared by vampires." + +A knock at the door interrupted her complaint. Mrs. Meecher entered, +ushering in a pleasant little man with spectacles and black bag. + +"The doctor to see you, Mr. Faucitt." Mrs. Meecher cast an appraising +eye at the invalid, as if to detect symptoms of approaching +discoloration. "I've been telling him that what I think you've gotten is +this here new Spanish influenza. Two more deaths there were in the paper +this morning, if you can believe what you see..." + +"I wonder," said the doctor, "if you would mind going and bringing me a +small glass of water?" + +"Why, sure." + +"Not a large glass--a small glass. Just let the tap run for a few +moments and take care not to spill any as you come up the stairs. I +always ask ladies, like our friend who has just gone," he added as the +door closed, "to bring me a glass of water. It keeps them amused and +interested and gets them out of the way, and they think I am going to do +a conjuring trick with it. As a matter of fact, I'm going to drink it. +Now let's have a look at you." + +The examination did not take long. At the end of it the doctor seemed +somewhat chagrined. + +"Our good friend's diagnosis was correct. I'd give a leg to say it +wasn't, but it was. It is this here new Spanish influenza. Not a bad +attack. You want to stay in bed and keep warm, and I'll write you out a +prescription. You ought to be nursed. Is this young lady a nurse?" + +"No, no, merely..." + +"Of course I'm a nurse," said Sally decidedly. "It isn't difficult, is +it, doctor? I know nurses smooth pillows. I can do that. Is there +anything else?" + +"Their principal duty is to sit here and prevent the excellent and +garrulous lady who has just left us from getting in. They must also be +able to aim straight with a book or an old shoe, if that small woolly +dog I met downstairs tries to force an entrance. If you are equal to +these tasks, I can leave the case in your hands with every confidence." + +"But, Sally, my dear," said Mr. Faucitt, concerned, "you must not waste +your time looking after me. You have a thousand things to occupy you." + +"There's nothing I want to do more than help you to get better. I'll +just go out and send a wire, and then I'll be right back." + +Five minutes later, Sally was in a Western Union office, telegraphing to +Gerald that she would be unable to reach Detroit in time for the +opening. + + + + + + + +CHAPTER VI + + + +FIRST AID FOR FILLMORE + + + +1 + + + +It was not till the following Friday that Sally was able to start for +Detroit. She arrived on the Saturday morning and drove to the Hotel +Statler. Having ascertained that Gerald was stopping in the hotel and +having 'phoned up to his room to tell him to join her, she went into the +dining-room and ordered breakfast. + +She felt low-spirited as she waited for the food to arrive. The nursing +of Mr. Faucitt had left her tired, and she had not slept well on the +train. But the real cause of her depression was the fact that there had +been a lack of enthusiasm in Gerald's greeting over the telephone just +now. He had spoken listlessly, as though the fact of her returning after +all these weeks was a matter of no account, and she felt hurt and +perplexed. + +A cup of coffee had a stimulating effect. Men, of course, were always +like this in the early morning. It would, no doubt, be a very different +Gerald who would presently bound into the dining-room, quickened and +restored by a cold shower-bath. In the meantime, here was food, and she +needed it. + +She was pouring out her second cup of coffee when a stout young man, of +whom she had caught a glimpse as he moved about that section of the +hotel lobby which was visible through the open door of the dining-room, +came in and stood peering about as though in search of someone. The +momentary sight she had had of this young man had interested Sally. She +had thought how extraordinarily like he was to her brother Fillmore. Now +she perceived that it was Fillmore himself. + +Sally was puzzled. What could Fillmore be doing so far west? She had +supposed him to be a permanent resident of New York. But, of course, +your man of affairs and vast interests flits about all over the place. +At any rate, here he was, and she called him. And, after he had stood in +the doorway looking in every direction except the right one for another +minute, he saw her and came over to her table. + +"Why, Sally?" His manner, she thought, was nervous--one might almost +have said embarrassed. She attributed this to a guilty conscience. +Presently he would have to break to her the news that he had become +engaged to be married without her sisterly sanction, and no doubt he was +wondering how to begin. "What are you doing here? I thought you were in +Europe." + +"I got back a week ago, but I've been nursing poor old Mr. Faucitt ever +since then. He's been ill, poor old dear. I've come here to see Mr. +Foster's play, 'The Primrose Way,' you know. Is it a success?" + +"It hasn't opened yet." + +"Don't be silly, Fill. Do pull yourself together. It opened last +Monday." + +"No, it didn't. Haven't you heard? They've closed all the theatres +because of this infernal Spanish influenza. Nothing has been playing +this week. You must have seen it in the papers." + +"I haven't had time to read the papers. Oh, Fill, what an awful shame!" + +"Yes, it's pretty tough. Makes the company all on edge. I've had the +darndest time, I can tell you." + +"Why, what have you got to do with it?" + +Fillmore coughed. + +"I--er--oh, I didn't tell you that. I'm sort of--er--mixed up in the +show. Cracknell--you remember he was at college with me--suggested that +I should come down and look at it. Shouldn't wonder if he wants me to +put money into it and so on." + +"I thought he had all the money in the world." + +"Yes, he has a lot, but these fellows like to let a pal in on a good +thing." + +"Is it a good thing?" + +"The play's fine." + +"That's what Mr. Faucitt said. But Mabel Hobson..." + +Fillmore's ample face registered emotion. + +"She's an awful woman, Sally! She can't act, and she throws her weight +about all the time. The other day there was a fuss about a +paper-knife..." + +"How do you mean, a fuss about a paper-knife?" + +"One of the props, you know. It got mislaid. I'm certain it wasn't my +fault..." + +"How could it have been your fault?" asked Sally wonderingly. Love +seemed to have the worst effects on Fillmore's mentality. + +"Well--er--you know how it is. Angry woman... blames the first person +she sees... This paper-knife..." + +Fillmore's voice trailed off into pained silence. + +"Mr. Faucitt said Elsa Doland was good." + +"Oh, she's all right," said Fillmore indifferently. "But--" His face +brightened and animation crept into his voice. "But the girl you want to +watch is Miss Winch. Gladys Winch. She plays the maid. She's only in the +first act, and hasn't much to say, except 'Did you ring, madam?' and +things like that. But it's the way she says 'em! Sally, that girl's a +genius! The greatest character actress in a dozen years! You mark my +words, in a darned little while you'll see her name up on Broadway in +electric light. Personality? Ask me! Charm? She wrote the words and +music! Looks?..." + +"All right! All right! I know all about it, Fill. And will you kindly +inform me how you dared to get engaged without consulting me?" + +Fillmore blushed richly. + +"Oh, do you know?" + +"Yes. Mr. Faucitt told me." + +"Well..." + +"Well?" + +"Well, I'm only human," argued Fillmore. + +"I call that a very handsome admission. You've got quite modest, +Fill." + +He had certainly changed for the better since their last meeting. + +It was as if someone had punctured him and let out all the pomposity. +If this was due, as Mr. Faucitt had suggested, to the influence of Miss +Winch, Sally felt that she could not but approve of the romance. + +"I'll introduce you sometime,' said Fillmore. + +"I want to meet her very much." + +"I'll have to be going now. I've got to see Bunbury. I thought he +might be in here." + +"Who's Bunbury?" + +"The producer. I suppose he is breakfasting in his room. I'd better go +up." + +"You are busy, aren't you. Little marvel! It's lucky they've got you to +look after them." + +Fillmore retired and Sally settled down to wait for Gerald, no longer +hurt by his manner over the telephone. Poor Gerald! No wonder he had +seemed upset. + +A few minutes later he came in. + +"Oh, Jerry darling," said Sally, as he reached the table, "I'm so sorry. +I've just been hearing about it." + +Gerald sat down. His appearance fulfilled the promise of his voice over +the telephone. A sort of nervous dullness wrapped him about like a +garment. + +"It's just my luck," he said gloomily. "It's the kind of thing that +couldn't happen to anyone but me. Damned fools! Where's the sense in +shutting the theatres, even if there is influenza about? They let people +jam against one another all day in the stores. If that doesn't hurt them +why should it hurt them to go to theatres? Besides, it's all infernal +nonsense about this thing. I don't believe there is such a thing as +Spanish influenza. People get colds in their heads and think they're +dying. It's all a fake scare." + +"I don't think it's that," said Sally. "Poor Mr. Faucitt had it quite +badly. That's why I couldn't come earlier." + +Gerald did not seem interested either by the news of Mr. Faucitt's +illness or by the fact that Sally, after delay, had at last arrived. He +dug a spoon sombrely into his grape-fruit. + +"We've been hanging about here day after day, getting bored to death all +the time... The company's going all to pieces. They're sick of +rehearsing and rehearsing when nobody knows if we'll ever open. They +were all keyed up a week ago, and they've been sagging ever since. It +will ruin the play, of course. My first chance! Just chucked away." + +Sally was listening with a growing feeling of desolation. She tried to +be fair, to remember that he had had a terrible disappointment and was +under a great strain. And yet... it was unfortunate that self-pity was a +thing she particularly disliked in a man. Her vanity, too, was hurt. It +was obvious that her arrival, so far from acting as a magic restorative, +had effected nothing. She could not help remembering, though it made her +feel disloyal, what Mr. Faucitt had said about Gerald. She had never +noticed before that he was remarkably self-centred, but he was +thrusting the fact upon her attention now. + +"That Hobson woman is beginning to make trouble," went on Gerald, +prodding in a despairing sort of way at scrambled eggs. "She ought never +to have had the part, never. She can't handle it. Elsa Doland could play +it a thousand times better. I wrote Elsa in a few lines the other day, +and the Hobson woman went right up in the air. You don't know what a +star is till you've seen one of these promoted clothes-props from the +Follies trying to be one. It took me an hour to talk her round and keep +her from throwing up her part." + +"Why not let her throw up her part?" + +"For heaven's sake talk sense," said Gerald querulously. "Do you +suppose that man Cracknell would keep the play on if she wasn't in it? +He would close the show in a second, and where would I be then? You +don't seem to realize that this is a big chance for me. I'd look a fool +throwing it away." + +"I see," said Sally, shortly. She had never felt so wretched in her +life. Foreign travel, she decided, was a mistake. It might be pleasant +and broadening to the mind, but it seemed to put you so out of touch +with people when you got back. She analysed her sensations, and arrived +at the conclusion that what she was resenting was the fact that Gerald +was trying to get the advantages of two attitudes simultaneously. A man +in trouble may either be the captain of his soul and superior to pity, +or he may be a broken thing for a woman to pet and comfort. Gerald, it +seemed to her, was advertising himself as an object for her +commiseration, and at the same time raising a barrier against it. He +appeared to demand her sympathy while holding himself aloof from it. She +had the uncomfortable sensation of feeling herself shut out and useless. + +"By the way," said Gerald, "there's one thing. I have to keep her +jollying along all the time, so for goodness' sake don't go letting it +out that we're engaged." + +Sally's chin went up with a jerk. This was too much. + +"If you find it a handicap being engaged to me..." + +"Don't be silly." Gerald took refuge in pathos. "Good God! It's tough! +Here am I, worried to death, and you..." + +Before he could finish the sentence, Sally's mood had undergone one of +those swift changes which sometimes made her feel that she must be +lacking in character. A simple, comforting thought had come to her, +altering her entire outlook. She had come off the train tired and +gritty, and what seemed the general out-of-jointness of the world was +entirely due, she decided, to the fact that she had not had a bath and +that her hair was all anyhow. She felt suddenly tranquil. If it was +merely her grubby and dishevelled condition that made Gerald seem to her +so different, all was well. She put her hand on his with a quick gesture +of penitence. + +"I'm so sorry," she said. "I've been a brute, but I do sympathize, +really." + +"I've had an awful time," mumbled Gerald. + +"I know, I know. But you never told me you were glad to see me." + +"Of course I'm glad to see you." + +"Why didn't you say so, then, you poor fish? And why didn't you ask me +if I had enjoyed myself in Europe?" + +"Did you enjoy yourself?" + +"Yes, except that I missed you so much. There! Now we can consider my +lecture on foreign travel finished, and you can go on telling me your +troubles." + +Gerald accepted the invitation. He spoke at considerable length, though +with little variety. It appeared definitely established in his mind that +Providence had invented Spanish influenza purely with a view to wrecking +his future. But now he seemed less aloof, more open to sympathy. The +brief thunderstorm had cleared the air. Sally lost that sense of +detachment and exclusion which had weighed upon her. + +"Well," said Gerald, at length, looking at his watch, "I suppose I had +better be off." + +"Rehearsal?" + +"Yes, confound it. It's the only way of getting through the day. Are +you coming along?" + +"I'll come directly I've unpacked and tidied myself up." + +"See you at the theatre, then." + +Sally went out and rang for the lift to take her up to her room. + + + +2 + + + +The rehearsal had started when she reached the theatre. As she entered +the dark auditorium, voices came to her with that thin and reedy effect +which is produced by people talking in an empty building. She sat down +at the back of the house, and, as her eyes grew accustomed to the gloom, +was able to see Gerald sitting in the front row beside a man with a bald +head fringed with orange hair whom she took correctly to be Mr. Bunbury, +the producer. Dotted about the house in ones and twos were members of +the company whose presence was not required in the first act. On the +stage, Elsa Doland, looking very attractive, was playing a scene with a +man in a bowler hat. She was speaking a line, as Sally came in. + +"Why, what do you mean, father?" + +"Tiddly-omty-om," was the bowler-hatted one's surprising reply. +"Tiddly-omty-om... long speech ending in 'find me in the library.' And +exit," said the man in the bowler hat, starting to do so. + +For the first time Sally became aware of the atmosphere of nerves. Mr. +Bunbury, who seemed to be a man of temperament, picked up his +walking-stick, which was leaning against the next seat, and flung it +with some violence across the house. + +"For God's sake!" said Mr. Bunbury. + +"Now what?" inquired the bowler hat, interested, pausing hallway across +the stage. + +"Do speak the lines, Teddy," exclaimed Gerald. "Don't skip them in that +sloppy fashion." + +"You don't want me to go over the whole thing?" asked the bowler hat, +amazed. + +"Yes!" + +"Not the whole damn thing?" queried the bowler hat, fighting with +incredulity. + +"This is a rehearsal," snapped Mr. Bunbury. "If we are not going to do +it properly, what's the use of doing it at all?" + +This seemed to strike the erring Teddy, if not as reasonable, at any +rate as one way of looking at it. He delivered the speech in an injured +tone and shuffled off. The atmosphere of tenseness was unmistakable now. +Sally could feel it. The world of the theatre is simply a large nursery +and its inhabitants children who readily become fretful if anything goes +wrong. The waiting and the uncertainty, the loafing about in strange +hotels in a strange city, the dreary rehearsing of lines which had been +polished to the last syllable more than a week ago--these things had +sapped the nerve of the Primrose Way company and demoralization had set +in. It would require only a trifle to produce an explosion. + +Elsa Doland now moved to the door, pressed a bell, and, taking a +magazine from the table, sat down in a chair near the footlights. A +moment later, in answer to the ring, a young woman entered, to be +greeted instantly by an impassioned bellow from Mr. Bunbury. + +"Miss Winch!" + +The new arrival stopped and looked out over the footlights, not in the +pained manner of the man in the bowler hat, but with the sort of genial +indulgence of one who has come to a juvenile party to amuse the +children. She was a square, wholesome, good-humoured looking girl with a +serious face, the gravity of which was contradicted by the faint smile +that seemed to lurk about the corner of her mouth. She was certainly not +pretty, and Sally, watching her with keen interest, was surprised that +Fillmore had had the sense to disregard surface homeliness and recognize +her charm. Deep down in Fillmore, Sally decided, there must lurk an +unsuspected vein of intelligence. + +"Hello?" said Miss Winch, amiably. + +Mr. Bunbury seemed profoundly moved. + +"Miss Winch, did I or did I not ask you to refrain from chewing gum +during rehearsal?" + +"That's right, so you did," admitted Miss Winch, chummily. + +"Then why are you doing it?" + +Fillmore's fiancée revolved the criticized refreshment about her tongue +for a moment before replying. + +"Bit o' business," she announced, at length. + +"What do you mean, a bit of business?" + +"Character stuff," explained Miss Winch in her pleasant, drawling voice. +"Thought it out myself. Maids chew gum, you know." + +Mr. Bunbury ruffled his orange hair in an over-wrought manner with the +palm of his right hand. + +"Have you ever seen a maid?" he asked, despairingly. + +"Yes, sir. And they chew gum." + +"I mean a parlour-maid in a smart house," moaned Mr. Bunbury. "Do you +imagine for a moment that in a house such as this is supposed to be the +parlour-maid would be allowed to come into the drawing-room champing +that disgusting, beastly stuff?" + +Miss Winch considered the point. + +"Maybe you're right." She brightened. "Listen! Great idea! Mr. Foster +can write in a line for Elsa, calling me down, and another giving me a +good come-back, and then another for Elsa saying something else, and +then something really funny for me, and so on. We can work it up into a +big comic scene. Five or six minutes, all laughs." + +This ingenious suggestion had the effect of depriving the producer +momentarily of speech, and while he was struggling for utterance, there +dashed out from the wings a gorgeous being in blue velvet and a hat of +such unimpeachable smartness that Sally ached at the sight of it with a +spasm of pure envy. + +"Say!" + +Miss Mabel Hobson had practically every personal advantage which nature +can bestow with the exception of a musical voice. Her figure was +perfect, her face beautiful, and her hair a mass of spun gold; but her +voice in moments of emotion was the voice of a peacock. + +"Say, listen to me for just one moment!" + +Mr. Bunbury recovered from his trance. + +"Miss Hobson! Please!" + +"Yes, that's all very well..." + +"You are interrupting the rehearsal." + +"You bet your sorrowful existence I'm interrupting the rehearsal," +agreed Miss Hobson, with emphasis. "And, if you want to make a little +easy money, you go and bet somebody ten seeds that I'm going to +interrupt it again every time there's any talk of writing up any darned +part in the show except mine. Write up other people's parts? Not while I +have my strength!" + +A young man with butter-coloured hair, who had entered from the wings in +close attendance on the injured lady, attempted to calm the storm. + +"Now, sweetie!" + +"Oh, can it, Reggie!" said Miss Hobson, curtly. + +Mr. Cracknell obediently canned it. He was not one of your brutal +cave-men. He subsided into the recesses of a high collar and began to +chew the knob of his stick. + +"I'm the star," resumed Miss Hobson, vehemently, "and, if you think +anybody else's part's going to be written up... well, pardon me while I +choke with laughter! If so much as a syllable is written into anybody's +part, I walk straight out on my two feet. You won't see me go, I'll be +so quick." + +Mr. Bunbury sprang to his feet and waved his hands. + +"For heaven's sake! Are we rehearsing, or is this a debating society? +Miss Hobson, nothing is going to be written into anybody's part. Now are +you satisfied?" + +"She said..." + +"Oh, never mind," observed Miss Winch, equably. "It was only a random +thought. Working for the good of the show all the time. That's me." + +"Now, sweetie!" pleaded Mr. Cracknell, emerging from the collar like a +tortoise. + +Miss Hobson reluctantly allowed herself to be reassured. + +"Oh, well, that's all right, then. But don't forget I know how to look +after myself," she said, stating a fact which was abundantly obvious to +all who had had the privilege of listening to her. "Any raw work, and +out I walk so quick it'll make you giddy." + +She retired, followed by Mr. Cracknell, and the wings swallowed her up. + +"Shall I say my big speech now?" inquired Miss Winch, over the +footlights. + +"Yes, yes! Get on with the rehearsal. We've wasted half the morning." + +"Did you ring, madam?" said Miss Winch to Elsa, who had been reading her +magazine placidly through the late scene. + +The rehearsal proceeded, and Sally watched it with a sinking heart. It +was all wrong. Novice as she was in things theatrical, she could see +that. There was no doubt that Miss Hobson was superbly beautiful and +would have shed lustre on any part which involved the minimum of words +and the maximum of clothes: but in the pivotal role of a serious play, +her very physical attributes only served to emphasize and point her +hopeless incapacity. Sally remembered Mr. Faucitt's story of the lady +who got the bird at Wigan. She did not see how history could fail to +repeat itself. The theatrical public of America will endure much from +youth and beauty, but there is a limit. + +A shrill, passionate cry from the front row, and Mr. Bunbury was on his +feet again. Sally could not help wondering whether things were going +particularly wrong to-day, or whether this was one of Mr. Bunbury's +ordinary mornings. + +"Miss Hobson!" + +The action of the drama had just brought that emotional lady on left +centre and had taken her across to the desk which stood on the other +side of the stage. The desk was an important feature of the play, for +it symbolized the absorption in business which, exhibited by her +husband, was rapidly breaking Miss Hobson's heart. He loved his desk +better than his young wife, that was what it amounted to, and no wife +can stand that sort of thing. + +"Oh, gee!" said Miss Hobson, ceasing to be the distressed wife and +becoming the offended star. "What's it this time?" + +"I suggested at the last rehearsal and at the rehearsal before and the +rehearsal before that, that, on that line, you, should pick up the +paper-knife and toy negligently with it. You did it yesterday, and +to-day you've forgotten it again." + +"My God!" cried Miss Hobson, wounded to the quick. "If this don't beat +everything! How the heck can I toy negligently with a paper-knife when +there's no paper-knife for me to toy negligently with?" + +"The paper-knife is on the desk." + +"It's not on the desk." + +"No paper-knife?" + +"No paper-knife. And it's no good picking on me. I'm the star, not the +assistant stage manager. If you're going to pick on anybody, pick on +him." + +The advice appeared to strike Mr. Bunbury as good. He threw back his +head and bayed like a bloodhound. + +There was a momentary pause, and then from the wings on the prompt side +there shambled out a stout and shrinking figure, in whose hand was a +script of the play and on whose face, lit up by the footlights, there +shone a look of apprehension. It was Fillmore, the Man of Destiny. + + + +3 + + + +Alas, poor Fillmore! He stood in the middle of the stage with the +lightning of Mr. Bunbury's wrath playing about his defenceless head, and +Sally, recovering from her first astonishment, sent a wave of sisterly +commiseration floating across the theatre to him. She did not often pity +Fillmore. His was a nature which in the sunshine of prosperity had a +tendency to grow a trifle lush; and such of the minor ills of life as +had afflicted him during the past three years, had, she considered, been +wholesome and educative and a matter not for concern but for +congratulation. Unmoved, she had watched him through that lean period +lunching on coffee and buckwheat cakes, and curbing from motives of +economy a somewhat florid taste in dress. But this was different. This +was tragedy. Somehow or other, blasting disaster must have smitten the +Fillmore bank-roll, and he was back where he had started. His presence +here this morning could mean nothing else. + +She recalled his words at the breakfast-table about financing the play. +How like Fillmore to try to save his face for the moment with an +outrageous bluff, though well aware that he would have to reveal the +truth sooner or later. She realized how he must have felt when he had +seen her at the hotel. Yes, she was sorry for Fillmore. + +And, as she listened to the fervent eloquence of Mr. Bunbury, she +perceived that she had every reason to be. Fillmore was having a bad +time. One of the chief articles of faith in the creed of all theatrical +producers is that if anything goes wrong it must be the fault of the +assistant stage manager and Mr. Bunbury was evidently orthodox in his +views. He was showing oratorical gifts of no mean order. The paper-knife +seemed to inspire him. Gradually, Sally began to get the feeling that +this harmless, necessary stage-property was the source from which sprang +most, if not all, of the trouble in the world. It had disappeared +before. Now it had disappeared again. Could Mr. Bunbury go on +struggling in a universe where this sort of thing happened? He seemed to +doubt it. Being a red-blooded, one-hundred-per-cent American man, he +would try hard, but it was a hundred to one shot that he would get +through. He had asked for a paper-knife. There was no paper-knife. Why +was there no paper-knife? Where was the paper-knife anyway? + +"I assure you, Mr. Bunbury," bleated the unhappy Fillmore, obsequiously. +"I placed it with the rest of the properties after the last rehearsal." + +"You couldn't have done." + +"I assure you I did." + +"And it walked away, I suppose," said Miss Hobson with cold scorn, +pausing in the operation of brightening up her lower lip with a +lip-stick. + +A calm, clear voice spoke. + +"It was taken away," said the calm, clear voice. + +Miss Winch had added herself to the symposium. She stood beside +Fillmore, chewing placidly. It took more than raised voices and +gesticulating hands to disturb Miss Winch. + +"Miss Hobson took it," she went on in her cosy, drawling voice. "I saw +her." + +Sensation in court. The prisoner, who seemed to feel his position +deeply, cast a pop-eyed glance full of gratitude at his advocate. Mr. +Bunbury, in his capacity of prosecuting attorney, ran his fingers +through his hair in some embarrassment, for he was regretting now that +he had made such a fuss. Miss Hobson thus assailed by an underling, spun +round and dropped the lip-stick, which was neatly retrieved by the +assiduous Mr. Cracknell. Mr. Cracknell had his limitations, but he was +rather good at picking up lip-sticks. + +"What's that? I took it? I never did anything of the sort." + +"Miss Hobson took it after the rehearsal yesterday," drawled Gladys +Winch, addressing the world in general, "and threw it negligently at the +theatre cat." + +Miss Hobson seemed taken aback. Her composure was not restored by Mr. +Bunbury's next remark. The producer, like his company, had been feeling +the strain of the past few days, and, though as a rule he avoided +anything in the nature of a clash with the temperamental star, this +matter of the missing paper-knife had bitten so deeply into his soul +that he felt compelled to speak his mind. + +"In future, Miss Hobson, I should be glad if, when you wish to throw +anything at the cat, you would not select a missile from the property +box. Good heavens!" he cried, stung by the way fate was maltreating him, +"I have never experienced anything like this before. I have been +producing plays all my life, and this is the first time this has +happened. I have produced Nazimova. Nazimova never threw paper-knives at +cats." + +"Well, I hate cats," said Miss Hobson, as though that settled it. + +"I," murmured Miss Winch, "love little pussy, her fur is so warm, and if +I don't hurt her she'll do me no..." + +"Oh, my heavens!" shouted Gerald Foster, bounding from his seat and for +the first time taking a share in the debate. "Are we going to spend the +whole day arguing about cats and paper-knives? For goodness' sake, clear +the stage and stop wasting time." + +Miss Hobson chose to regard this intervention as an affront. + +"Don't shout at me, Mr. Foster!" + +"I wasn't shouting at you." + +"If you have anything to say to me, lower your voice." + +"He can't," observed Miss Winch. "He's a tenor." + +"Nazimova never..." began Mr. Bunbury. + +Miss Hobson was not to be diverted from her theme by reminiscences of +Nazimova. She had not finished dealing with Gerald. + +"In the shows I've been in," she said, mordantly, "the author wasn't +allowed to go about the place getting fresh with the leading lady. In +the shows I've been in the author sat at the back and spoke when he was +spoken to. In the shows I've been in..." + +Sally was tingling all over. This reminded her of the dog-fight on the +Roville sands. She wanted to be in it, and only the recognition that it +was a private fight and that she would be intruding kept her silent. The +lure of the fray, however, was too strong for her wholly to resist it. +Almost unconsciously, she had risen from her place and drifted down the +aisle so as to be nearer the white-hot centre of things. She was now +standing in the lighted space by the orchestra-pit, and her presence +attracted the roving attention of Miss Hobson, who, having concluded her +remarks on authors and their legitimate sphere of activity, was looking +about for some other object of attack. + +"Who the devil," inquired Miss Hobson, "is that?" + +Sally found herself an object of universal scrutiny and wished that she +had remained in the obscurity of the back rows. + +"I am Mr. Nicholas' sister," was the best method of identification that +she could find. + +"Who's Mr. Nicholas?" + +Fillmore timidly admitted that he was Mr. Nicholas. He did it in the +manner of one in the dock pleading guilty to a major charge, and at +least half of those present seemed surprised. To them, till now, +Fillmore had been a nameless thing, answering to the shout of "Hi!" + +Miss Hobson received the information with a laugh of such exceeding +bitterness that strong men blanched and Mr. Cracknell started so +convulsively that he nearly jerked his collar off its stud. + +"Now, sweetie!" urged Mr. Cracknell. + +Miss Hobson said that Mr. Cracknell gave her a pain in the gizzard. She +recommended his fading away, and he did so--into his collar. He seemed +to feel that once well inside his collar he was "home" and safe from +attack. + +"I'm through!" announced Miss Hobson. It appeared that Sally's presence +had in some mysterious fashion fulfilled the function of the last straw. +"This is the by-Goddest show I was ever in! I can stand for a whole lot, +but when it comes to the assistant stage manager being allowed to fill +the theatre with his sisters and his cousins and his aunts it's time to +quit." + +"But, sweetie!" pleaded Mr. Cracknell, coming to the surface. + +"Oh, go and choke yourself!" said Miss Hobson, crisply. And, swinging +round like a blue panther, she strode off. A door banged, and the sound +of it seemed to restore Mr. Cracknell's power of movement. He, too, shot +up stage and disappeared. + +"Hello, Sally," said Elsa Doland, looking up from her magazine. The +battle, raging all round her, had failed to disturb her detachment. +"When did you get back?" + +Sally trotted up the steps which had been propped against the stage to +form a bridge over the orchestra pit. + +"Hello, Elsa." + +The late debaters had split into groups. Mr. Bunbury and Gerald were +pacing up and down the central aisle, talking earnestly. Fillmore had +subsided into a chair. + +"Do you know Gladys Winch?" asked Elsa. + +Sally shook hands with the placid lodestar of her brother's affections. +Miss Winch, on closer inspection, proved to have deep grey eyes and +freckles. Sally's liking for her increased. + +"Thank you for saving Fillmore from the wolves," she said. "They would +have torn him in pieces but for you." + +"Oh, I don't know," said Miss Winch. + +"It was noble." + +"Oh, well!" + +"I think," said Sally, "I'll go and have a talk with Fillmore. He looks +as though he wanted consoling." + +She made her way to that picturesque ruin. + + + +4 + + + +Fillmore had the air of a man who thought it wasn't loaded. A wild, +startled expression had settled itself upon his face and he was +breathing heavily. + +"Cheer up!" said Sally. Fillmore jumped like a stricken jelly. "Tell +me all," said Sally, sitting down beside him. "I leave you a gentleman +of large and independent means, and I come back and find you one of the +wage-slaves again. How did it all happen?" + +"Sally," said Fillmore, "I will be frank with you. Can you lend me ten +dollars?" + +"I don't see how you make that out an answer to my question, but here +you are." + +"Thanks." Fillmore pocketed the bill. "I'll let you have it back next +week. I want to take Miss Winch out to lunch." + +"If that's what you want it for, don't look on it as a loan, take it as +a gift with my blessing thrown in." She looked over her shoulder at Miss +Winch, who, the cares of rehearsal being temporarily suspended, was +practising golf-shots with an umbrella at the other side of the stage. +"However did you have the sense to fall in love with her, Fill?" + +"Do you like her?" asked Fillmore, brightening. + +"I love her." + +"I knew you would. She's just the right girl for me, isn't she?" + +"She certainly is." + +"So sympathetic." + +"Yes." + +"So kind." + +"Yes." + +"And she's got brains enough for two, which is the exact quantity +the girl who marries you will need." + +Fillmore drew himself up with as much hauteur as a stout man sitting in +a low chair can achieve. + +"Some day I will make you believe in me, Sally." + +"Less of the Merchant Prince, my lad," said Sally, firmly. "You just +confine yourself to explaining how you got this way, instead of taking +up my valuable time telling me what you mean to do in the future. You've +lost all your money?" + +"I have suffered certain reverses," said Fillmore, with dignity, "which +have left me temporarily... Yes, every bean," he concluded simply. + +"How?" + +"Well..." Fillmore hesitated. "I've had bad luck, you know. First I +bought Consolidated Rails for the rise, and they fell. So that went +wrong." + +"Yes?" + +"And then I bought Russian Roubles for the fall, and they rose. So that +went wrong." + +"Good gracious! Why, I've heard all this before." + +"Who told you?" + +"No, I remember now. It's just that you remind me of a man I met at +Roville. He was telling me the story of his life, and how he had made a +hash of everything. Well, that took all you had, I suppose?" + +"Not quite. I had a few thousand left, and I went into a deal that +really did look cast-iron." + +"And that went wrong!" + +"It wasn't my fault," said Fillmore querulously. "It was just my +poisonous luck. A man I knew got me to join a syndicate which had bought +up a lot of whisky. The idea was to ship it into Chicago in +herring-barrels. We should have cleaned up big, only a mutt of a +detective took it into his darned head to go fooling about with a +crowbar. Officious ass! It wasn't as if the barrels weren't labelled +'Herrings' as plainly as they could be," said Fillmore with honest +indignation. He shuddered. "I nearly got arrested." + +"But that went wrong? Well, that's something to be thankful for. +Stripes wouldn't suit your figure." Sally gave his arm a squeeze. She +was very fond of Fillmore, though for the good of his soul she generally +concealed her affection beneath a manner which he had once compared, not +without some reason, to that of a governess who had afflicted their +mutual childhood. "Never mind, you poor ill-used martyr. Things are sure +to come right. We shall see you a millionaire some day. And, oh heavens, +brother Fillmore, what a bore you'll be when you are! I can just see you +being interviewed and giving hints to young men on how to make good. +'Mr. Nicholas attributes his success to sheer hard work. He can lay his +hand on his bulging waistcoat and say that he has never once indulged in +those rash get-rich-quick speculations, where you buy for the rise and +watch things fall and then rush out and buy for the fall and watch 'em +rise.' Fill... I'll tell you what I'll do. They all say it's the first +bit of money that counts in building a vast fortune. I'll lend you some +of mine." + +"You will? Sally, I always said you were an ace." + +"I never heard you. You oughtn't to mumble so." + +"Will you lend me twenty thousand dollars?" + +Sally patted his hand soothingly. + +"Come slowly down to earth," she said. "Two hundred was the sum I had +in mind." + +"I want twenty thousand." + +"You'd better rob a bank. Any policeman will direct you to a good +bank." + +"I'll tell you why I want twenty thousand." + +"You might just mention it." + +"If I had twenty thousand, I'd buy this production from Cracknell. +He'll be back in a few minutes to tell us that the Hobson woman has +quit: and, if she really has, you take it from me that he will close the +show. And, even if he manages to jolly her along this time and she comes +back, it's going to happen sooner or later. It's a shame to let a show +like this close. I believe in it, Sally. It's a darn good play. With +Elsa Doland in the big part, it couldn't fail." + +Sally started. Her money was too recent for her to have grown fully +accustomed to it, and she had never realized that she was in a position +to wave a wand and make things happen on any big scale. The financing of +a theatrical production had always been to her something mysterious and +out of the reach of ordinary persons like herself. Fillmore, that +spacious thinker, had brought it into the sphere of the possible. + +"He'd sell for less than that, of course, but one would need a bit in +hand. You have to face a loss on the road before coming into New York. +I'd give you ten per cent on your money, Sally." + +Sally found herself wavering. The prudent side of her nature, which +hitherto had steered her safely through most of life's rapids, seemed +oddly dormant. Sub-consciously she was aware that on past performances +Fillmore was decidedly not the man to be allowed control of anybody's +little fortune, but somehow the thought did not seem to grip her. He had +touched her imagination. + +"It's a gold-mine!" + +Sally's prudent side stirred in its sleep. Fillmore had chosen an +unfortunate expression. To the novice in finance the word gold-mine had +repellent associations. If there was one thing in which Sally had +proposed not to invest her legacy, it was a gold-mine; what she had had +in view, as a matter of fact, had been one of those little fancy shops +which are called Ye Blue Bird or Ye Corner Shoppe, or something like +that, where you sell exotic bric-a-brac to the wealthy at extortionate +prices. She knew two girls who were doing splendidly in that line. As +Fillmore spoke those words, Ye Corner Shoppe suddenly looked very good +to her. + +At this moment, however, two things happened. Gerald and Mr. Bunbury, +in the course of their perambulations, came into the glow of the +footlights, and she was able to see Gerald's face: and at the same time +Mr. Reginald Cracknell hurried on to the stage, his whole demeanour that +of the bearer of evil tidings. + +The sight of Gerald's face annihilated Sally's prudence at a single +stroke. Ye Corner Shoppe, which a moment before had been shining +brightly before her mental eye, flickered and melted out. The whole +issue became clear and simple. Gerald was miserable and she had it in +her power to make him happy. He was sullenly awaiting disaster and she +with a word could avert it. She wondered that she had ever hesitated. + +"All right," she said simply. + +Fillmore quivered from head to foot. A powerful electric shock could +not have produced a stronger convulsion. He knew Sally of old as +cautious and clear-headed, by no means to be stampeded by a brother's +eloquence; and he had never looked on this thing as anything better than +a hundred to one shot. + +"You'll do it?" he whispered, and held his breath. After all he might +not have heard correctly. + +"Yes." + +All the complex emotion in Fillmore's soul found expression in one vast +whoop. It rang through the empty theatre like the last trump, beating +against the back wall and rising in hollow echoes to the very gallery. +Mr. Bunbury, conversing in low undertones with Mr. Cracknell across the +footlights, shied like a startled mule. There was reproach and menace in +the look he cast at Fillmore, and a minute earlier it would have reduced +that financial magnate to apologetic pulp. But Fillmore was not to be +intimidated now by a look. He strode down to the group at the +footlights, + +"Cracknell," he said importantly, "one moment, I should like a word with +you." + + + + + + + + + +CHAPTER VII + + + +SOME MEDITATIONS ON SUCCESS + + + +If actors and actresses are like children in that they are readily +depressed by disaster, they have the child's compensating gift of being +easily uplifted by good fortune. It amazed Sally that any one mortal +should have been able to spread such universal happiness as she had done +by the simple act of lending her brother Fillmore twenty thousand +dollars. If the Millennium had arrived, the members of the Primrose Way +Company could not have been on better terms with themselves. The +lethargy and dispiritedness, caused by their week of inaction, fell from +them like a cloak. The sudden elevation of that creature of the abyss, +the assistant stage manager, to the dizzy height of proprietor of the +show appealed to their sense of drama. Most of them had played in pieces +where much the same thing had happened to the persecuted heroine round +about eleven o'clock, and the situation struck them as theatrically +sound. Also, now that she had gone, the extent to which Miss Hobson had +acted as a blight was universally recognized. + +A spirit of optimism reigned, and cheerful rumours became current. The +bowler-hatted Teddy had it straight from the lift-boy at his hotel that +the ban on the theatres was to be lifted on Tuesday at the latest; while +no less an authority than the cigar-stand girl at the Pontchatrain had +informed the man who played the butler that Toledo and Cleveland were +opening to-morrow. It was generally felt that the sun was bursting +through the clouds and that Fate would soon despair of the hopeless task +of trying to keep good men down. + +Fillmore was himself again. We all have our particular mode of +self-expression in moments of elation. Fillmore's took the shape of +buying a new waistcoat and a hundred half-dollar cigars and being very +fussy about what he had for lunch. It may have been an optical illusion, +but he appeared to Sally to put on at least six pounds in weight on the +first day of the new regime. As a serf looking after paper-knives and +other properties, he had been--for him--almost slim. As a manager he +blossomed out into soft billowy curves, and when he stood on the +sidewalk in front of the theatre, gloating over the new posters which +bore the legend, + + + +FILLMORE NICHOLAS + +PRESENTS + + + +the populace had to make a detour to get round him. + +In this era of bubbling joy, it was hard that Sally, the fairy godmother +responsible for it all, should not have been completely happy too; and +it puzzled her why she was not. But whatever it was that cast the faint +shadow refused obstinately to come out from the back of her mind and +show itself and be challenged. It was not till she was out driving in a +hired car with Gerald one afternoon on Belle Isle that enlightenment +came. + +Gerald, since the departure of Miss Hobson, had been at his best. Like +Fillmore, he was a man who responded to the sunshine of prosperity. His +moodiness had vanished, and all his old charm had returned. And yet... +it seemed to Sally, as the car slid smoothly through the pleasant woods +and fields by the river, that there was something that jarred. + +Gerald was cheerful and talkative. He, at any rate, found nothing wrong +with life. He held forth spaciously on the big things he intended to do. + +"If this play get over--and it's going to--I'll show 'em!" His jaw was +squared, and his eyes glowed as they stared into the inviting future. +"One success--that's all I need--then watch me! I haven't had a chance +yet, but..." + +His voice rolled on, but Sally had ceased to listen. It was the time of +year when the chill of evening follows swiftly on the mellow warmth of +afternoon. The sun had gone behind the trees, and a cold wind was +blowing up from the river. And quite suddenly, as though it was the wind +that had cleared her mind, she understood what it was that had been +lurking at the back of her thoughts. For an instant it stood out nakedly +without concealment, and the world became a forlorn place. She had +realized the fundamental difference between man's outlook on life and +woman's. + +Success! How men worshipped it, and how little of themselves they had +to spare for anything else. Ironically, it was the theme of this very +play of Gerald's which she had saved from destruction. Of all the men +she knew, how many had any view of life except as a race which they must +strain every nerve to win, regardless of what they missed by the wayside +in their haste? Fillmore--Gerald--all of them. There might be a woman in +each of their lives, but she came second--an afterthought--a thing for +their spare time. Gerald was everything to her. His success would never +be more than a side-issue as far as she was concerned. He himself, +without any of the trappings of success, was enough for her. But she was +not enough for him. A spasm of futile jealousy shook her. She shivered. + +"Cold?" said Gerald. "I'll tell the man to drive back... I don't see +any reason why this play shouldn't run a year in New York. Everybody +says it's good... if it does get over, they'll all be after me. I..." + +Sally stared out into a bleak world. The sky was a leaden grey, and the +wind from the river blew with a dismal chill. + + + + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + + +REAPPEARANCE OF MR. CARMYLE--AND GINGER + + + +1 + + + +When Sally left Detroit on the following Saturday, accompanied by +Fillmore, who was returning to the metropolis for a few days in order to +secure offices and generally make his presence felt along Broadway, her +spirits had completely recovered. She felt guiltily that she had been +fanciful, even morbid. Naturally men wanted to get on in the world. It +was their job. She told herself that she was bound up with Gerald's +success, and that the last thing of which she ought to complain was the +energy he put into efforts of which she as well as he would reap the +reward. + +To this happier frame of mind the excitement of the last few days had +contributed. Detroit, that city of amiable audiences, had liked "The +Primrose Way." The theatre, in fulfilment of Teddy's prophecy, had been +allowed to open on the Tuesday, and a full house, hungry for +entertainment after its enforced abstinence, had welcomed the play +wholeheartedly. The papers, not always in agreement with the applause +of a first-night audience, had on this occasion endorsed the verdict, +with agreeable unanimity hailing Gerald as the coming author and Elsa +Doland as the coming star. There had even been a brief mention of +Fillmore as the coming manager. But there is always some trifle that +jars in our greatest moments, and Fillmore's triumph had been almost +spoilt by the fact that the only notice taken of Gladys Winch was by the +critic who printed her name--spelt Wunch--in the list of those whom the +cast "also included." + +"One of the greatest character actresses on the stage," said Fillmore +bitterly, talking over this outrage with Sally on the morning after the +production. + +From this blow, however, his buoyant nature had soon enabled him to +rally. Life contained so much that was bright that it would have been +churlish to concentrate the attention on the one dark spot. Business had +been excellent all through the week. Elsa Doland had got better at every +performance. The receipt of a long and agitated telegram from Mr. +Cracknell, pleading to be allowed to buy the piece back, the passage of +time having apparently softened Miss Hobson, was a pleasant incident. +And, best of all, the great Ike Schumann, who owned half the theatres in +New York and had been in Detroit superintending one of his musical +productions, had looked in one evening and stamped "The Primrose Way" +with the seal of his approval. As Fillmore sat opposite Sally on the +train, he radiated contentment and importance. + +"Yes, do," said Sally, breaking a long silence. + +Fillmore awoke from happy dreams. + +"Eh?" + +"I said 'Yes, do.' I think you owe it to your position." + +"Do what?" + +"Buy a fur coat. Wasn't that what you were meditating about?" + +"Don't be a chump," said Fillmore, blushing nevertheless. It was true +that once or twice during the past week he had toyed negligently, as Mr. +Bunbury would have said, with the notion, and why not? A fellow must +keep warm. + +"With an astrakhan collar," insisted Sally. + +"As a matter of fact," said Fillmore loftily, his great soul ill-attuned +to this badinage, "what I was really thinking about at the moment was +something Ike said." + +"Ike?" + +"Ike Schumann. He's on the train. I met him just now." + +"We call him Ike!" + +"Of course I call him Ike," said Fillmore heatedly. "Everyone calls +him Ike." + +"He wears a fur coat," Sally murmured. + +Fillmore registered annoyance. + +"I wish you wouldn't keep on harping on that damned coat. And, anyway, +why shouldn't I have a fur coat?" + +"Fill... ! How can you be so brutal as to suggest that I ever said you +shouldn't? Why, I'm one of the strongest supporters of the fur coat. +With big cuffs. And you must roll up Fifth Avenue in your car, and I'll +point and say 'That's my brother!' 'Your brother? No!' 'He is, really.' +'You're joking. Why, that's the great Fillmore Nicholas.' 'I know. But +he really is my brother. And I was with him when he bought that coat.'" + +"Do leave off about the coat!" + +"'And it isn't only the coat,' I shall say. 'It's what's underneath. +Tucked away inside that mass of fur, dodging about behind that dollar +cigar, is one to whom we point with pride... '" + +Fillmore looked coldly at his watch. + +"I've got to go and see Ike Schumann." + +"We are in hourly consultation with Ike." + +"He wants to see me about the show. He suggests putting it into Chicago +before opening in New York." + +"Oh no," cried Sally, dismayed. + +"Why not?" + +Sally recovered herself. Identifying Gerald so closely with his play, +she had supposed for a moment that if the piece opened in Chicago it +would mean a further prolonged separation from him. But of course there +would be no need, she realized, for him to stay with the company after +the first day or two. + +"You're thinking that we ought to have a New York reputation before +tackling Chicago. There's a lot to be said for that. Still, it works +both ways. A Chicago run would help us in New York. Well, I'll have to +think it over," said Fillmore, importantly, "I'll have to think it +over." + +He mused with drawn brows. + +"All wrong," said Sally. + +"Eh?" + +"Not a bit like it. The lips should be compressed and the forefinger of +the right hand laid in a careworn way against the right temple. You've a +lot to learn. Fill." + +"Oh, stop it!" + +"Fillmore Nicholas," said Sally, "if you knew what pain it gives me to +josh my only brother, you'd be sorry for me. But you know it's for your +good. Now run along and put Ike out of his misery. I know he's waiting +for you with his watch out. 'You do think he'll come, Miss Nicholas?' +were his last words to me as he stepped on the train, and oh, Fill, the +yearning in his voice. 'Why, of course he will, Mr. Schumann,' I said. +'For all his exalted position, my brother is kindliness itself. Of +course he'll come.' 'If I could only think so!' he said with a gulp. 'If +I could only think so. But you know what these managers are. A thousand +calls on their time. They get brooding on their fur coats and forget +everything else.' 'Have no fear, Mr. Schumann,' I said. 'Fillmore +Nicholas is a man of his word.'" + +She would have been willing, for she was a girl who never believed in +sparing herself where it was a question of entertaining her nearest and +dearest, to continue the dialogue, but Fillmore was already moving down +the car, his rigid back a silent protest against sisterly levity. Sally +watched him disappear, then picked up a magazine and began to read. + +She had just finished tracking a story of gripping interest through a +jungle of advertisements, only to find that it was in two parts, of +which the one she was reading was the first, when a voice spoke. + +"How do you do, Miss Nicholas?" + +Into the seat before her, recently released from the weight of the +coming manager, Bruce Carmyle of all people in the world insinuated +himself with that well-bred air of deferential restraint which never +left him. + + + +2 + + + +Sally was considerably startled. Everybody travels nowadays, of +course, and there is nothing really remarkable in finding a man in +America whom you had supposed to be in Europe: but nevertheless she was +conscious of a dream-like sensation, as though the clock had been turned +back and a chapter of her life reopened which she had thought closed for +ever. + +"Mr. Carmyle!" she cried. + +If Sally had been constantly in Bruce Carmyle's thoughts since they had +parted on the Paris express, Mr. Carmyle had been very little in +Sally's--so little, indeed, that she had had to search her memory for a +moment before she identified him. + +"We're always meeting on trains, aren't we?" she went on, her composure +returning. "I never expected to see you in America." + +"I came over." + +Sally was tempted to reply that she gathered that, but a sudden +embarrassment curbed her tongue. She had just remembered that at their +last meeting she had been abominably rude to this man. She was never +rude to anyone, without subsequent remorse. She contented herself with a +tame "Yes." + +"Yes," said Mr. Carmyle, "it is a good many years since I have taken a +real holiday. My doctor seemed to think I was a trifle run down. It +seemed a good opportunity to visit America. Everybody," said Mr. Carmyle +oracularly, endeavouring, as he had often done since his ship had left +England, to persuade himself that his object in making the trip had not +been merely to renew his acquaintance with Sally, "everybody ought to +visit America at least once. It is part of one's education." + +"And what are your impressions of our glorious country?" said Sally +rallying. + +Mr. Carmyle seemed glad of the opportunity of lecturing on an impersonal +subject. He, too, though his face had shown no trace of it, had been +embarrassed in the opening stages of the conversation. The sound of his +voice restored him. + +"I have been visiting Chicago," he said after a brief travelogue. + +"Oh!" + +"A wonderful city." + +"I've never seen it. I've come from Detroit." + +"Yes, I heard you were in Detroit." + +Sally's eyes opened. + +"You heard I was in Detroit? Good gracious! How?" + +"I--ah--called at your New York address and made inquiries," said Mr. +Carmyle a little awkwardly. + +"But how did you know where I lived?" + +"My cousin--er--Lancelot told me." + +Sally was silent for a moment. She had much the same feeling that comes +to the man in the detective story who realizes that he is being +shadowed. Even if this almost complete stranger had not actually come +to America in direct pursuit of her, there was no disguising the fact +that he evidently found her an object of considerable interest. It was +a compliment, but Sally was not at all sure that she liked it. Bruce +Carmyle meant nothing to her, and it was rather disturbing to find that +she was apparently of great importance to him. She seized on the mention +of Ginger as a lever for diverting the conversation from its present too +intimate course. + +"How is Mr. Kemp?" she asked. + +Mr. Carmyle's dark face seemed to become a trifle darker. + +"We have had no news of him," he said shortly. + +"No news? How do you mean? You speak as though he had disappeared." + +"He has disappeared!" + +"Good heavens! When?" + +"Shortly after I saw you last." + +"Disappeared!" + +Mr. Carmyle frowned. Sally, watching him, found her antipathy stirring +again. There was something about this man which she had disliked +instinctively from the first, a sort of hardness. + +"But where has he gone to?" + +"I don't know." Mr. Carmyle frowned again. The subject of Ginger was +plainly a sore one. "And I don't want to know," he went on heatedly, a +dull flush rising in the cheeks which Sally was sure he had to shave +twice a day. "I don't care to know. The Family have washed their hands +of him. For the future he may look after himself as best he can. I +believe he is off his head." + +Sally's rebellious temper was well ablaze now, but she fought it down. +She would dearly have loved to give battle to Mr. Carmyle--it was odd, +she felt, how she seemed to have constituted herself Ginger's champion +and protector--but she perceived that, if she wished, as she did, to +hear more of her red-headed friend, he must be humoured and +conciliated. + +"But what happened? What was all the trouble about?" + +Mr. Carmyle's eyebrows met. + +"He--insulted his uncle. His uncle Donald. He insulted him--grossly. +The one man in the world he should have made a point of--er--" + +"Keeping in with?" + +"Yes. His future depended upon him." + +"But what did he do?" cried Sally, trying hard to keep a thoroughly +reprehensible joy out of her voice. + +"I have heard no details. My uncle is reticent as to what actually took +place. He invited Lancelot to dinner to discuss his plans, and it +appears that Lancelot--defied him. Defied him! He was rude and +insulting. My uncle refuses to have anything more to do with him. +Apparently the young fool managed to win some money at the tables at +Roville, and this seems to have turned his head completely. My uncle +insists that he is mad. I agree with him. Since the night of that dinner +nothing has been heard of Lancelot." + +Mr. Carmyle broke off to brood once more, and before Sally could speak +the impressive bulk of Fillmore loomed up in the aisle beside them. +Explanations seemed to Fillmore to be in order. He cast a questioning +glance at the mysterious stranger, who, in addition to being in +conversation with his sister, had collared his seat. + +"Oh, hullo, Fill," said Sally. "Fillmore, this is Mr. Carmyle. We met +abroad. My brother Fillmore, Mr. Carmyle." + +Proper introduction having been thus effected, Fillmore approved of Mr. +Carmyle. His air of being someone in particular appealed to him. + +"Strange you meeting again like this," he said affably. + +The porter, who had been making up berths along the car, was now +hovering expectantly in the offing. + +"You two had better go into the smoking room," suggested Sally. "I'm +going to bed." + +She wanted to be alone, to think. Mr. Carmyle's tale of a roused and +revolting Ginger had stirred her. + +The two men went off to the smoking-room, and Sally found an empty seat +and sat down to wait for her berth to be made up. She was aglow with a +curious exhilaration. So Ginger had taken her advice! Excellent Ginger! +She felt proud of him. She also had that feeling of complacency, +amounting almost to sinful pride, which comes to those who give advice +and find it acted upon. She had the emotions of a creator. After all, +had she not created this new Ginger? It was she who had stirred him up. +It was she who had unleashed him. She had changed him from a meek +dependent of the Family to a ravening creature, who went about the place +insulting uncles. + +It was a feat, there was no denying it. It was something attempted, +something done: and by all the rules laid down by the poet it should, +therefore, have earned a night's repose. Yet, Sally, jolted by the +train, which towards the small hours seemed to be trying out some new +buck-and-wing steps of its own invention, slept ill, and presently, as +she lay awake, there came to her bedside the Spectre of Doubt, gaunt and +questioning. Had she, after all, wrought so well? Had she been wise in +tampering with this young man's life? + +"What about it?" said the Spectre of Doubt. + + + +3 + + + +Daylight brought no comforting answer to the question. Breakfast failed +to manufacture an easy mind. Sally got off the train, at the Grand +Central station in a state of remorseful concern. She declined the offer +of Mr. Carmyle to drive her to the boarding-house, and started to walk +there, hoping that the crisp morning air would effect a cure. + +She wondered now how she could ever have looked with approval on her +rash act. She wondered what demon of interference and meddling had +possessed her, to make her blunder into people's lives, upsetting them. +She wondered that she was allowed to go around loose. She was nothing +more nor less than a menace to society. Here was an estimable young man, +obviously the sort of young man who would always have to be assisted +through life by his relatives, and she had deliberately egged him on to +wreck his prospects. She blushed hotly as she remembered that mad +wireless she had sent him from the boat. + +Miserable Ginger! She pictured him, his little stock of money gone, +wandering foot-sore about London, seeking in vain for work; forcing +himself to call on Uncle Donald; being thrown down the front steps by +haughty footmen; sleeping on the Embankment; gazing into the dark waters +of the Thames with the stare of hopelessness; climbing to the parapet +and... + +"Ugh!" said Sally. + +She had arrived at the door of the boarding-house, and Mrs. Meecher was +regarding her with welcoming eyes, little knowing that to all practical +intents and purposes she had slain in his prime a red-headed young man +of amiable manners and--when not ill-advised by meddling, muddling +females--of excellent behaviour. + +Mrs. Meecher was friendly and garrulous. Variety, the journal which, +next to the dog Toto, was the thing she loved best in the world, had +informed her on the Friday morning that Mr. Foster's play had got over +big in Detroit, and that Miss Doland had made every kind of hit. It was +not often that the old alumni of the boarding-house forced their way +after this fashion into the Hall of Fame, and, according to Mrs. +Meecher, the establishment was ringing with the news. That blue ribbon +round Toto's neck was worn in honour of the triumph. There was also, +though you could not see it, a chicken dinner in Toto's interior, by way +of further celebration. + +And was it true that Mr. Fillmore had bought the piece? A great man, was +Mrs. Meecher's verdict. Mr. Faucitt had always said so... + +"Oh, how is Mr. Faucitt?" Sally asked, reproaching herself for having +allowed the pressure of other matters to drive all thoughts of her late +patient from her mind. + +"He's gone," said Mrs. Meecher with such relish that to Sally, in her +morbid condition, the words had only one meaning. She turned white and +clutched at the banisters. + +"Gone!" + +"To England," added Mrs. Meecher. Sally was vastly relieved. + +"Oh, I thought you meant..." + +"Oh no, not that." Mrs. Meecher sighed, for she had been a little +disappointed in the old gentleman, who started out as such a promising +invalid, only to fall away into the dullness of robust health once more. +"He's well enough. I never seen anybody better. You'd think," said Mrs. +Meecher, bearing bearing up with difficulty under her grievance, "you'd +think this here new Spanish influenza was a sort of a tonic or somep'n, +the way he looks now. Of course," she added, trying to find +justification for a respected lodger, "he's had good news. His brother's +dead." + +"What!" + +"Not, I don't mean, that that was good news, far from it, though, come +to think of it, all flesh is as grass and we all got to be prepared for +somep'n of the sort breaking loose...but it seems this here new brother of +his--I didn't know he'd a brother, and I don't suppose you knew he had a +brother. Men are secretive, ain't they!--this brother of his has left +him a parcel of money, and Mr. Faucitt he had to get on the Wednesday +boat quick as he could and go right over to the other side to look after +things. Wind up the estate, I believe they call it. Left in a awful +hurry, he did. Sent his love to you and said he'd write. Funny him +having a brother, now, wasn't it? Not," said Mrs. Meecher, at heart a +reasonable woman, "that folks don't have brothers. I got two myself, one +in Portland, Oregon, and the other goodness knows where he is. But what +I'm trying to say..." + +Sally disengaged herself, and went up to her room. For a brief while +the excitement which comes of hearing good news about those of whom we +are fond acted as a stimulant, and she felt almost cheerful. Dear old +Mr. Faucitt. She was sorry for his brother, of course, though she had +never had the pleasure of his acquaintance and had only just heard that +he had ever existed; but it was nice to think that her old friend's +remaining years would be years of affluence. + +Presently, however, she found her thoughts wandering back into their +melancholy groove. She threw herself wearily on the bed. She was tired +after her bad night. + +But she could not sleep. Remorse kept her awake. Besides, she could +hear Mrs. Meecher prowling disturbingly about the house, apparently in +search of someone, her progress indicated by creaking boards and the +strenuous yapping of Toto. + +Sally turned restlessly, and, having turned remained for a long instant +transfixed and rigid. She had seen something, and what she had seen was +enough to surprise any girl in the privacy of her bedroom. From +underneath the bed there peeped coyly forth an undeniably masculine shoe +and six inches of a grey trouser-leg. + +Sally bounded to the floor. She was a girl of courage, and she meant to +probe this matter thoroughly. + +"What are you doing under my bed?" + +The question was a reasonable one, and evidently seemed to the intruder +to deserve an answer. There was a muffled sneeze, and he began to crawl +out. + +The shoe came first. Then the legs. Then a sturdy body in a dusty +coat. And finally there flashed on Sally's fascinated gaze a head of so +nearly the maximum redness that it could only belong to one person in +the world. + +"Ginger!" + +Mr. Lancelot Kemp, on all fours, blinked up at her. + +"Oh, hullo!" he said. + + + + + + + +CHAPTER IX + + + +GINGER BECOMES A RIGHT-HAND MAN + + + +It was not till she saw him actually standing there before her with his +hair rumpled and a large smut on the tip of his nose, that Sally really +understood how profoundly troubled she had been about this young man, +and how vivid had been that vision of him bobbing about on the waters of +the Thames, a cold and unappreciated corpse. She was a girl of keen +imagination, and she had allowed her imagination to riot unchecked. +Astonishment, therefore, at the extraordinary fact of his being there +was for the moment thrust aside by relief. Never before in her life had +she experienced such an overwhelming rush of exhilaration. She flung +herself into a chair and burst into a screech of laughter which even to +her own ears sounded strange. It struck Ginger as hysterical. + +"I say, you know!" said Ginger, as the merriment showed no signs of +abating. Ginger was concerned. Nasty shock for a girl, finding blighters +under her bed. + +Sally sat up, gurgling, and wiped her eyes. + +"Oh, I am glad to see you," she gasped. + +"No, really?" said Ginger, gratified. "That's fine." It occurred to him +that some sort of apology would be a graceful act. "I say, you know, +awfully sorry. About barging in here, I mean. Never dreamed it was your +room. Unoccupied, I thought." + +"Don't mention it. I ought not to have disturbed you. You were having +a nice sleep, of course. Do you always sleep on the floor?" + +"It was like this..." + +"Of course, if you're wearing it for ornament, as a sort of +beauty-spot," said Sally, "all right. But in case you don't know, you've +a smut on your nose." + +"Oh, my aunt! Not really?" + +"Now would I deceive you on an important point like that?" + +"Do you mind if I have a look in the glass?" + +"Certainly, if you can stand it." + +Ginger moved hurriedly to the dressing-table. + +"You're perfectly right," he announced, applying his handkerchief. + +"I thought I was. I'm very quick at noticing things." + +"My hair's a bit rumpled, too." + +"Very much so." + +"You take my tis," said Ginger, earnestly, "and never lie about under +beds. There's nothing in it." + +"That reminds me. You won't be offended if I asked you something?" + +"No, no. Go ahead." + +"It's rather an impertinent question. You may resent it." + +"No, no." + +"Well, then, what were you doing under my bed?" + +"Oh, under your bed?" + +"Yes. Under my bed. This. It's a bed, you know. Mine. My bed. You +were under it. Why? Or putting it another way, why were you under my +bed?" + +"I was hiding." + +"Playing hide-and-seek? That explains it." + +"Mrs. What's-her-name--Beecher--Meecher--was after me. + +Sally shook her head disapprovingly. + +"You mustn't encourage Mrs. Meecher in these childish pastimes. It +unsettles her." + +Ginger passed an agitated hand over his forehead. + +"It's like this..." + +"I hate to keep criticizing your appearance," said Sally, "and +personally I like it; but, when you clutched your brow just then, you +put about a pound of dust on it. Your hands are probably grubby." + +Ginger inspected them. + +"They are!" + +"Why not make a really good job of it and have a wash?" + +"Do you mind?" + +"I'd prefer it." + +"Thanks awfully. I mean to say it's your basin, you know, and all that. +What I mean is, seem to be making myself pretty well at home." + +"Oh, no." + +"Touching the matter of soap..." + +"Use mine. We Americans are famous for our hospitality." + +"Thanks awfully." + +"The towel is on your right." + +"Thanks awfully." + +"And I've a clothes brush in my bag." + +"Thanks awfully." + +Splashing followed like a sea-lion taking a dip. "Now, then," said +Sally, "why were you hiding from Mrs. Meecher?" + +A careworn, almost hunted look came into Ginger's face. "I say, you +know, that woman is rather by way of being one of the lads, what! Scares +me! Word was brought that she was on the prowl, so it seemed to me a +judicious move to take cover till she sort of blew over. If she'd found +me, she'd have made me take that dog of hers for a walk." + +"Toto?" + +"Toto. You know," said Ginger, with a strong sense of injury, "no dog's +got a right to be a dog like that. I don't suppose there's anyone keener +on dogs than I am, but a thing like a woolly rat." He shuddered +slightly. "Well, one hates to be seen about with it in the public +streets." + +"Why couldn't you have refused in a firm but gentlemanly manner to take +Toto out?" + +"Ah! There you rather touch the spot. You see, the fact of the matter +is, I'm a bit behind with the rent, and that makes it rather hard to +take what you might call a firm stand." + +"But how can you be behind with the rent? I only left here the Saturday +before last and you weren't in the place then. You can't have been here +more than a week." + +"I've been here just a week. That's the week I'm behind with." + +"But why? You were a millionaire when I left you at Roville." + +"Well, the fact of the matter is, I went back to the tables that night +and lost a goodish bit of what I'd won. And, somehow or another, when I +got to America, the stuff seemed to slip away." + +"What made you come to America at all?" said Sally, asking the question +which, she felt, any sensible person would have asked at the opening of +the conversation. + +One of his familiar blushes raced over Ginger's face. "Oh, I thought I +would. Land of opportunity, you know." + +"Have you managed to find any of the opportunities yet?" + +"Well, I have got a job of sorts, I'm a waiter at a rummy little place +on Second Avenue. The salary isn't big, but I'd have wangled enough out +of it to pay last week's rent, only they docked me a goodish bit for +breaking plates and what not. The fact is, I'm making rather a hash of +it." + +"Oh, Ginger! You oughtn't to be a waiter!" + +"That's what the boss seems to think." + +"I mean, you ought to be doing something ever so much better." + +"But what? You've no notion how well all these blighters here seem to be +able to get along without my help. I've tramped all over the place, +offering my services, but they all say they'll try to carry on as they +are." + +Sally reflected. + +"I know!" + +"What?" + +"I'll make Fillmore give you a job. I wonder I didn't think of it +before." + +"Fillmore?" + +"My brother. Yes, he'll be able to use you." + +"What as?" + +Sally considered. + +"As a--as a--oh, as his right-hand man." + +"Does he want a right-hand man?" + +"Sure to. He's a young fellow trying to get along. Sure to want a +right-hand man." + +"'M yes," said Ginger reflectively. "Of course, I've never been a +right-hand man, you know." + +"Oh, you'd pick it up. I'll take you round to him now. He's staying at +the Astor." + +"There's just one thing," said Ginger. + +"What's that?" + +"I might make a hash of it." + +"Heavens, Ginger! There must be something in this world that you +wouldn't make a hash of. Don't stand arguing any longer. Are you dry? +and clean? Very well, then. Let's be off." + +"Right ho." + +Ginger took a step towards the door, then paused, rigid, with one leg in +the air, as though some spell had been cast upon him. From the passage +outside there had sounded a shrill yapping. Ginger looked at Sally. Then +he looked--longingly--at the bed. + +"Don't be such a coward," said Sally, severely. + +"Yes, but..." + +"How much do you owe Mrs. Meecher?" + +"Round about twelve dollars, I think it is." + +"I'll pay her." + +Ginger flushed awkwardly. + +"No, I'm hanged if you will! I mean," he stammered, "it's frightfully +good of you and all that, and I can't tell you how grateful I am, but +honestly, I couldn't..." + +Sally did not press the point. She liked him the better for a rugged +independence, which in the days of his impecuniousness her brother +Fillmore had never dreamed of exhibiting. + +"Very well," she said. "Have it your own way. Proud. That's me all +over, Mabel. Ginger!" She broke off sharply. "Pull yourself together. +Where is your manly spirit? I'd be ashamed to be such a coward." + +"Awfully sorry, but, honestly, that woolly dog..." + +"Never mind the dog. I'll see you through." + +They came out into the passage almost on top of Toto, who was stalking +phantom rats. Mrs. Meecher was manoeuvring in the background. Her face +lit up grimly at the sight of Ginger. + +"Mister Kemp! I been looking for you." + +Sally intervened brightly. + +"Oh, Mrs. Meecher," she said, shepherding her young charge through the +danger zone, "I was so surprised to meet Mr. Kemp here. He is a great +friend of mine. We met in France. We're going off now to have a long +talk about old times, and then I'm taking him to see my brother..." + +"Toto..." + +"Dear little thing! You ought to take him for a walk," said Sally. +"It's a lovely day. Mr. Kemp was saying just now that he would have +liked to take him, but we're rather in a hurry and shall probably have +to get into a taxi. You've no idea how busy my brother is just now. If +we're late, he'll never forgive us." + +She passed on down the stairs, leaving Mrs. Meecher dissatisfied but +irresolute. There was something about Sally which even in her +pre-wealthy days had always baffled Mrs. Meecher and cramped her style, +and now that she was rich and independent she inspired in the chatelaine +of the boarding-house an emotion which was almost awe. The front door +had closed before Mrs. Meecher had collected her faculties; and Ginger, +pausing on the sidewalk, drew a long breath. + +"You know, you're wonderful!" he said, regarding Sally with unconcealed +admiration. + +She accepted the compliment composedly. + +"Now we'll go and hunt up Fillmore," she said. "But there's no need to +hurry, of course, really. We'll go for a walk first, and then call at +the Astor and make him give us lunch. I want to hear all about you. I've +heard something already. I met your cousin, Mr. Carmyle. He was on the +train coming from Detroit. Did you know that he was in America?" + +"No, I've--er--rather lost touch with the Family." + +"So I gathered from Mr. Carmyle. And I feel hideously responsible. It +was all through me that all this happened." + +"Oh, no." + +"Of course it was. I made you what you are to-day--I hope I'm +satisfied--I dragged and dragged you down until the soul within you +died, so to speak. I know perfectly well that you wouldn't have dreamed +of savaging the Family as you seem to have done if it hadn't been for +what I said to you at Roville. Ginger, tell me, what did happen? I'm +dying to know. Mr. Carmyle said you insulted your uncle!" + +"Donald. Yes, we did have a bit of a scrap, as a matter of fact. He +made me go out to dinner with him and we--er--sort of disagreed. To +start with, he wanted me to apologize to old Scrymgeour, and I rather +gave it a miss." + +"Noble fellow!" + +"Scrymgeour?" + +"No, silly! You." + +"Oh, ah!" Ginger blushed. "And then there was all that about the soup, +you know." + +"How do you mean, 'all that about the soup'? What about the soup? What +soup?" + +"Well, things sort of hotted up a bit when the soup arrived." + +"I don't understand." + +"I mean, the trouble seemed to start, as it were, when the waiter had +finished ladling out the mulligatawny. Thick soup, you know." + +"I know mulligatawny is a thick soup. Yes?" + +"Well, my old uncle--I'm not blaming him, don't you know--more his +misfortune than his fault--I can see that now--but he's got a heavy +moustache. Like a walrus, rather, and he's a bit apt to inhale the stuff +through it. And I--well, I asked him not to. It was just a suggestion, +you know. He cut up fairly rough, and by the time the fish came round we +were more or less down on the mat chewing holes in one another. My +fault, probably. I wasn't feeling particularly well-disposed towards the +Family that night. I'd just had a talk with Bruce--my cousin, you +know--in Piccadilly, and that had rather got the wind up me. Bruce +always seems to get on my nerves a bit somehow and--Uncle Donald asking +me to dinner and all that. By the way, did you get the books?" + +"What books?" + +"Bruce said he wanted to send you some books. That was why I gave him +your address." Sally stared. + +"He never sent me any books." + +"Well, he said he was going to, and I had to tell him where to send +them." + +Sally walked on, a little thoughtfully. She was not a vain girl, but it +was impossible not to perceive in the light of this fresh evidence that +Mr. Carmyle had made a journey of three thousand miles with the sole +object of renewing his acquaintance with her. It did not matter, of +course, but it was vaguely disturbing. No girl cares to be dogged by a +man she rather dislikes. + +"Go on telling me about your uncle," she said. + +"Well, there's not much more to tell. I'd happened to get that wireless +of yours just before I started out to dinner with him, and I was more or +less feeling that I wasn't going to stand any rot from the Family. I'd +got to the fish course, hadn't I? Well, we managed to get through that +somehow, but we didn't survive the fillet steak. One thing seemed to +lead to another, and the show sort of bust up. He called me a good many +things, and I got a bit fed-up, and finally I told him I hadn't any more +use for the Family and was going to start out on my own. And--well, I +did, don't you know. And here I am." + +Sally listened to this saga breathlessly. More than ever did she feel +responsible for her young protégé, and any faint qualms which she had +entertained as to the wisdom of transferring practically the whole of +her patrimony to the care of so erratic a financier as her brother +vanished. It was her plain duty to see that Ginger was started well in +the race of life, and Fillmore was going to come in uncommonly handy. + +"We'll go to the Astor now," she said, "and I'll introduce you to +Fillmore. He's a theatrical manager and he's sure to have something for +you." + +"It's awfully good of you to bother about me." + +"Ginger," said Sally, "I regard you as a grandson. Hail that cab, will +you?" + + + + + + + +CHAPTER X + + + +SALLY IN THE SHADOWS + + + +1 + + + +It seemed to Sally in the weeks that followed her reunion with Ginger +Kemp that a sort of golden age had set in. On all the frontiers of her +little kingdom there was peace and prosperity, and she woke each morning +in a world so neatly smoothed and ironed out that the most captious +pessimist could hardly have found anything in it to criticize. + +True, Gerald was still a thousand miles away. Going to Chicago to +superintend the opening of "The Primrose Way"; for Fillmore had acceded +to his friend Ike's suggestion in the matter of producing it first in +Chicago, and he had been called in by a distracted manager to revise the +work of a brother dramatist, whose comedy was in difficulties at one of +the theatres in that city; and this meant he would have to remain on the +spot for some time to come. It was disappointing, for Sally had been +looking forward to having him back in New York in a few days; but she +refused to allow herself to be depressed. Life as a whole was much too +satisfactory for that. Life indeed, in every other respect, seemed +perfect. Fillmore was going strong; Ginger was off her conscience; she +had found an apartment; her new hat suited her; and "The Primrose Way" +was a tremendous success. Chicago, it appeared from Fillmore's account, +was paying little attention to anything except "The Primrose Way." +National problems had ceased to interest the citizens. Local problems +left them cold. Their minds were riveted to the exclusion of all else on +the problem of how to secure seats. The production of the piece, +according to Fillmore, had been the most terrific experience that had +come to stir Chicago since the great fire. + +Of all these satisfactory happenings, the most satisfactory, to Sally's +thinking, was the fact that the problem of Ginger's future had been +solved. Ginger had entered the service of the Fillmore Nicholas +Theatrical Enterprises Ltd. (Managing Director, Fillmore +Nicholas)--Fillmore would have made the title longer, only that was all +that would go on the brass plate--and was to be found daily in the outer +office, his duties consisting mainly, it seemed, in reading the evening +papers. What exactly he was, even Ginger hardly knew. Sometimes he felt +like the man at the wheel, sometimes like a glorified office boy, and +not so very glorified at that. For the most part he had to prevent the +mob rushing and getting at Fillmore, who sat in semi-regal state in the +inner office pondering great schemes. + +But, though there might be an occasional passing uncertainty in +Ginger's mind as to just what he was supposed to be doing in exchange +for the fifty dollars he drew every Friday, there was nothing uncertain +about his gratitude to Sally for having pulled the strings and enabled +him to do it. He tried to thank her every time they met, and nowadays +they were meeting frequently; for Ginger was helping her to furnish her +new apartment. In this task, he spared no efforts. He said that it kept +him in condition. + +"And what I mean to say is," said Ginger, pausing in the act of carrying +a massive easy chair to the third spot which Sally had selected in the +last ten minutes, "if I didn't sweat about a bit and help you after the +way you got me that job..." + +"Ginger, desist," said Sally. + +"Yes, but honestly..." + +"If you don't stop it, I'll make you move that chair into the next +room." + +"Shall I?" Ginger rubbed his blistered hands and took a new grip. +"Anything you say." + +"Silly! Of course not. The only other rooms are my bedroom, the +bathroom and the kitchen. What on earth would I want a great lumbering +chair in them for? All the same, I believe the first we chose was the +best." + +"Back she goes, then, what?" + +Sally reflected frowningly. This business of setting up house was +causing her much thought. + +"No," she decided. "By the window is better." She looked at him +remorsefully. "I'm giving you a lot of trouble." + +"Trouble!" Ginger, accompanied by a chair, staggered across the room. +"The way I look at it is this." He wiped a bead of perspiration from his +freckled forehead. "You got me that job, and..." + +"Stop!" + +"Right ho... Still, you did, you know." + +Sally sat down in the armchair and stretched herself. Watching Ginger +work had given her a vicarious fatigue. She surveyed the room proudly. +It was certainly beginning to look cosy. The pictures were up, the +carpet down, the furniture very neatly in order. For almost the first +time in her life she had the restful sensation of being at home. She had +always longed, during the past three years of boarding-house existence, +for a settled abode, a place where she could lock the door on herself +and be alone. The apartment was small, but it was undeniably a haven. +She looked about her and could see no flaw in it... except... She had a +sudden sense of something missing. + +"Hullo!" she said. "Where's that photograph of me? I'm sure I put it on +the mantelpiece yesterday." + +His exertions seemed to have brought the blood to Ginger's face. He was +a rich red. He inspected the mantelpiece narrowly. + +"No. No photograph here." + +"I know there isn't. But it was there yesterday. Or was it? I know I +meant to put it there. Perhaps I forgot. It's the most beautiful thing +you ever saw. Not a bit like me; but what of that? They touch 'em up in +the dark-room, you know. I value it because it looks the way I should +like to look if I could." + +"I've never had a beautiful photograph taken of myself," said Ginger, +solemnly, with gentle regret. + +"Cheer up!" + +"Oh, I don't mind. I only mentioned..." + +"Ginger," said Sally, "pardon my interrupting your remarks, which I know +are valuable, but this chair is--not--right! It ought to be where it +was at the beginning. Could you give your imitation of a pack-mule just +once more? And after that I'll make you some tea. If there's any tea-- +or milk--or cups." + +"There are cups all right. I know, because I smashed two the day before +yesterday. I'll nip round the corner for some milk, shall I?" + +"Yes, please nip. All this hard work has taken it out of me terribly." + +Over the tea-table Sally became inquisitive. + +"What I can't understand about this job of yours. Ginger--which as you +are just about to observe, I was noble enough to secure for you--is the +amount of leisure that seems to go with it. How is it that you are able +to spend your valuable time--Fillmore's valuable time, rather--juggling +with my furniture every day?" + +"Oh, I can usually get off." + +"But oughtn't you to be at your post doing--whatever it is you do? What +do you do?" + +Ginger stirred his tea thoughtfully and gave his mind to the question. + +"Well, I sort of mess about, you know." He pondered. "I interview +divers blighters and tell 'em your brother is out and take their +names and addresses and... oh, all that sort of thing." + +"Does Fillmore consult you much?" + +"He lets me read some of the plays that are sent in. Awful tosh most of +them. Sometimes he sends me off to a vaudeville house of an evening." + +"As a treat?" + +"To see some special act, you know. To report on it. In case he might +want to use it for this revue of his." + +"Which revue?" + +"Didn't you know he was going to put on a revue? Oh, rather. A whacking +big affair. Going to cut out the Follies and all that sort of thing." + +"But--my goodness!" Sally was alarmed. It was just like Fillmore, she +felt, to go branching out into these expensive schemes when he ought to +be moving warily and trying to consolidate the small success he had had. +All his life he had thought in millions where the prudent man would have +been content with hundreds. An inexhaustible fount of optimism bubbled +eternally within him. "That's rather ambitious," she said. + +"Yes. Ambitious sort of cove, your brother. Quite the Napoleon." + +"I shall have to talk to him," said Sally decidedly. She was annoyed +with Fillmore. Everything had been going so beautifully, with everybody +peaceful and happy and prosperous and no anxiety anywhere, till he had +spoiled things. Now she would have to start worrying again. + +"Of course," argued Ginger, "there's money in revues. Over in London +fellows make pots out of them." + +Sally shook her head. + +"It won't do," she said. "And I'll tell you another thing that won't +do. This armchair. Of course it ought to be over by the window. You can +see that yourself, can't you." + +"Absolutely!" said Ginger, patiently preparing for action once more. + + + +2 + + + +Sally's anxiety with regard to her ebullient brother was not lessened by +the receipt shortly afterwards of a telegram from Miss Winch in Chicago. + +Have you been feeding Fillmore meat? + +the telegram ran: and, while Sally could not have claimed that she +completely understood it, there was a sinister suggestion about the +message which decided her to wait no longer before making +investigations. She tore herself away from the joys of furnishing and +went round to the headquarters of the Fillmore Nicholas Theatrical +Enterprises Ltd. (Managing Director, Fillmore Nicholas) without delay. + +Ginger, she discovered on arrival, was absent from his customary post, +his place in the outer office being taken by a lad of tender years and +pimply exterior, who thawed and cast off a proud reserve on hearing +Sally's name, and told her to walk right in. Sally walked right in, and +found Fillmore with his feet on an untidy desk, studying what appeared +to be costume-designs. + +"Ah, Sally!" he said in the distrait, tired voice which speaks of vast +preoccupations. Prosperity was still putting in its silent, deadly work +on the Hope of the American Theatre. What, even at as late an epoch as +the return from Detroit, had been merely a smooth fullness around the +angle of the jaw was now frankly and without disguise a double chin. He +was wearing a new waistcoat and it was unbuttoned. "I am rather busy," +he went on. "Always glad to see you, but I am rather busy. I have a +hundred things to attend to." + +"Well, attend to me. That'll only make a hundred and one. Fill, what's +all this I hear about a revue?" + +Fillmore looked as like a small boy caught in the act of stealing jam as +it is possible for a great theatrical manager to look. He had been +wondering in his darker moments what Sally would say about that project +when she heard of it, and he had hoped that she would not hear of it +until all the preparations were so complete that interference would be +impossible. He was extremely fond of Sally, but there was, he knew, a +lamentable vein of caution in her make-up which might lead her to +criticize. And how can your man of affairs carry on if women are buzzing +round criticizing all the time? He picked up a pen and put it down; +buttoned his waistcoat and unbuttoned it; and scratched his ear with one +of the costume-designs. + +"Oh yes, the revue!" + +"It's no good saying 'Oh yes'! You know perfectly well it's a crazy +idea." + +"Really... these business matters... this interference..." + +"I don't want to run your affairs for you, Fill, but that money of mine +does make me a sort of partner, I suppose, and I think I have a right to +raise a loud yell of agony when I see you risking it on a..." + +"Pardon me," said Fillmore loftily, looking happier. "Let me explain. +Women never understand business matters. Your money is tied up +exclusively in 'The Primrose Way,' which, as you know, is a tremendous +success. You have nothing whatever to worry about as regards any new +production I may make." + +"I'm not worrying about the money. I'm worrying about you." + +A tolerant smile played about the lower slopes of Fillmore's face. + +"Don't be alarmed about me. I'm all right." + +"You aren't all right. You've no business, when you've only just got +started as a manager, to be rushing into an enormous production like +this. You can't afford it." + +"My dear child, as I said before, women cannot understand these things. +A man in my position can always command money for a new venture." + +"Do you mean to say you have found somebody silly enough to put up +money?" + +"Certainly. I don't know that there is any secret about it. Your +friend, Mr. Carmyle, has taken an interest in some of my forthcoming +productions." + +"What!" Sally had been disturbed before, but she was aghast now. + +This was something she had never anticipated. Bruce Carmyle seemed to +be creeping into her life like an advancing tide. There appeared to be +no eluding him. Wherever she turned, there he was, and she could do +nothing but rage impotently. The situation was becoming impossible. + +Fillmore misinterpreted the note of dismay in her voice. + +"It's quite all right," he assured her. "He's a very rich man. Large +private means, besides his big income. Even if anything goes wrong..." + +"It isn't that. It's..." + +The hopelessness of explaining to Fillmore stopped Sally. And while she +was chafing at this new complication which had come to upset the orderly +routine of her life there was an outburst of voices in the other office. +Ginger's understudy seemed to be endeavouring to convince somebody that +the Big Chief was engaged and not to be intruded upon. In this he was +unsuccessful, for the door opened tempestuously and Miss Winch sailed +in. + +"Fillmore, you poor nut," said Miss Winch, for though she might wrap up +her meaning somewhat obscurely in her telegraphic communications, when +it came to the spoken word she was directness itself, "stop picking +straws in your hair and listen to me. You're dippy!" + +The last time Sally had seen Fillmore's fiancée, she had been impressed +by her imperturbable calm. Miss Winch, in Detroit, had seemed a girl +whom nothing could ruffle. That she had lapsed now from this serene +placidity, struck Sally as ominous. Slightly though she knew her, she +felt that it could be no ordinary happening that had so animated her +sister-in-law-to-be. + +"Ah! Here you are!" said Fillmore. He had started to his feet +indignantly at the opening of the door, like a lion bearded in its den, +but calm had returned when he saw who the intruder was. + +"Yes, here I am!" Miss Winch dropped despairingly into a swivel-chair, +and endeavoured to restore herself with a stick of chewing-gum. +"Fillmore, darling, you're the sweetest thing on earth, and I love you, +but on present form you could just walk straight into Bloomingdale and +they'd give you the royal suite." + +"My dear girl..." + +"What do you think?" demanded Miss Winch, turning to Sally. + +"I've just been telling him," said Sally, welcoming this ally, "I think +it's absurd at this stage of things for him to put on an enormous +revue..." + +"Revue?" Miss Winch stopped in the act of gnawing her gum. "What +revue?" She flung up her arms. "I shall have to swallow this gum," she +said. "You can't chew with your head going round. Are you putting on a +revue too?" + +Fillmore was buttoning and unbuttoning his waistcoat. He had a hounded +look. + +"Certainly, certainly," he replied in a tone of some feverishness. "I +wish you girls would leave me to manage..." + +"Dippy!" said Miss Winch once more. "Telegraphic address: Tea-Pot, +Matteawan." She swivelled round to Sally again. "Say, listen! This boy +must be stopped. We must form a gang in his best interests and get him +put away. What do you think he proposes doing? I'll give you three +guesses. Oh, what's the use? You'd never hit it. This poor wandering lad +has got it all fixed up to star me--me--in a new show!" + +Fillmore removed a hand from his waistcoat buttons and waved it +protestingly. + +"I have used my own judgment..." + +"Yes, sir!" proceeded Miss Winch, riding over the interruption. +"That's what he's planning to spring on an unsuspicious public. I'm +sitting peacefully in my room at the hotel in Chicago, pronging a few +cents' worth of scrambled eggs and reading the morning paper, when the +telephone rings. Gentleman below would like to see me. Oh, ask him to +wait. Business of flinging on a few clothes. Down in elevator. Bright +sunrise effects in lobby." + +"What on earth do you mean?" + +"The gentleman had a head of red hair which had to be seen to be +believed," explained Miss Winch. "Lit up the lobby. Management had +switched off all the electrics for sake of economy. An Englishman he +was. Nice fellow. Named Kemp." + +"Oh, is Ginger in Chicago?" said Sally. "I wondered why he wasn't on +his little chair in the outer office. + +"I sent Kemp to Chicago," said Fillmore, "to have a look at the show. +It is my policy, if I am unable to pay periodical visits myself, to send +a representative..." + +"Save it up for the long winter evenings," advised Miss Winch, cutting +in on this statement of managerial tactics. "Mr. Kemp may have been +there to look at the show, but his chief reason for coming was to tell +me to beat it back to New York to enter into my kingdom. Fillmore wanted +me on the spot, he told me, so that I could sit around in this office +here, interviewing my supporting company. Me! Can you or can you not," +inquired Miss Winch frankly, "tie it?" + +"Well..." Sally hesitated. + +"Don't say it! I know it just as well as you do. It's too sad for +words." + +"You persist in underestimating your abilities, Gladys," said Fillmore +reproachfully. "I have had a certain amount of experience in theatrical +matters--I have seen a good deal of acting--and I assure you that as a +character-actress you..." + +Miss Winch rose swiftly from her seat, kissed Fillmore energetically, +and sat down again. She produced another stick of chewing-gum, then +shook her head and replaced it in her bag. + +"You're a darling old thing to talk like that," she said, "and I hate to +wake you out of your daydreams, but, honestly, Fillmore, dear, do just +step out of the padded cell for one moment and listen to reason. I know +exactly what has been passing in your poor disordered bean. You took +Elsa Doland out of a minor part and made her a star overnight. She goes +to Chicago, and the critics and everybody else rave about her. As a +matter of fact," she said to Sally with enthusiasm, for hers was an +honest and generous nature, "you can't realize, not having seen her play +there, what an amazing hit she has made. She really is a sensation. +Everybody says she's going to be the biggest thing on record. Very well, +then, what does Fillmore do? The poor fish claps his hand to his +forehead and cries 'Gadzooks! An idea! I've done it before, I'll do it +again. I'm the fellow who can make a star out of anything.' And he picks +on me!" + +"My dear girl..." + +"Now, the flaw in the scheme is this. Elsa is a genius, and if he +hadn't made her a star somebody else would have done. But little Gladys? +That's something else again." She turned to Sally. "You've seen me in +action, and let me tell you you've seen me at my best. Give me a maid's +part, with a tray to carry on in act one and a couple of 'Yes, madam's' +in act two, and I'm there! Ellen Terry hasn't anything on me when it +comes to saying 'Yes, madam,' and I'm willing to back myself for gold, +notes, or lima beans against Sarah Bernhardt as a tray-carrier. But +there I finish. That lets me out. And anybody who thinks otherwise is +going to lose a lot of money. Between ourselves the only thing I can do +really well is to cook..." + +"My dear Gladys!" cried Fillmore revolted. + +"I'm a heaven-born cook, and I don't mind notifying the world to that +effect. I can cook a chicken casserole so that you would leave home and +mother for it. Also my English pork-pies! One of these days I'll take an +afternoon off and assemble one for you. You'd be surprised! But +acting--no. I can't do it, and I don't want to do it. I only went on the +stage for fun, and my idea of fun isn't to plough through a star part +with all the critics waving their axes in the front row, and me knowing +all the time that it's taking money out of Fillmore's bankroll that +ought to be going towards buying the little home with stationary +wash-tubs... Well, that's that, Fillmore, old darling. I thought I'd +just mention it." + +Sally could not help being sorry for Fillmore. He was sitting with his +chin on his hands, staring moodily before him--Napoleon at Elba. It was +plain that this project of taking Miss Winch by the scruff of the neck +and hurling her to the heights had been very near his heart. + +"If that's how you feel," he said in a stricken voice, "there is nothing +more to say." + +"Oh, yes there is. We will now talk about this revue of yours. It's +off!" + +Fillmore bounded to his feet; he thumped the desk with a well-nourished +fist. A man can stand just so much. + +"It is not off! Great heavens! It's too much! I will not put up with +this interference with my business concerns. I will not be tied and +hampered. Here am I, a man of broad vision and... and... broad vision... +I form my plans... my plans... I form them... I shape my schemes... and +what happens? A horde of girls flock into my private office while I am +endeavouring to concentrate... and concentrate... I won't stand it. +Advice, yes. Interference, no. I... I... I... and kindly remember that!" + +The door closed with a bang. A fainter detonation announced the +whirlwind passage through the outer office. Footsteps died away down the +corridor. + +Sally looked at Miss Winch, stunned. A roused and militant Fillmore was +new to her. + +Miss Winch took out the stick of chewing-gum again and unwrapped it. + +"Isn't he cute!" she said. "I hope he doesn't get the soft kind," she +murmured, chewing reflectively. + +"The soft kind." + +"He'll be back soon with a box of candy," explained Miss Winch, "and he +will get that sloshy, creamy sort, though I keep telling him I like the +other. Well, one thing's certain. Fillmore's got it up his nose. He's +beginning to hop about and sing in the sunlight. It's going to be hard +work to get that boy down to earth again." Miss Winch heaved a gentle +sigh. "I should like him to have enough left in the old stocking to pay +the first year's rent when the wedding bells ring out." She bit +meditatively on her chewing-gum. "Not," she said, "that it matters. I'd +be just as happy in two rooms and a kitchenette, so long as Fillmore was +there. You've no notion how dippy I am about him." Her freckled face +glowed. "He grows on me like a darned drug. And the funny thing is that +I keep right on admiring him though I can see all the while that he's +the most perfect chump. He is a chump, you know. That's what I love +about him. That and the way his ears wiggle when he gets excited. Chumps +always make the best husbands. When you marry. Sally, grab a chump. Tap +his forehead first, and if it rings solid, don't hesitate. All the +unhappy marriages come from the husband having brains. What good are +brains to a man? They only unsettle him." She broke off and scrutinized +Sally closely. "Say, what do you do with your skin?" + +She spoke with solemn earnestness which made Sally laugh. + +"What do I do with my skin? I just carry it around with me." + +"Well," said Miss Winch enviously, "I wish I could train my darned fool +of a complexion to get that way. Freckles are the devil. When I was +eight I had the finest collection in the Middle West, and I've been +adding to it right along. Some folks say lemon-juice'll cure 'em. Mine +lap up all I give 'em and ask for more. There's only one way of getting +rid of freckles, and that is to saw the head off at the neck." + +"But why do you want to get rid of them?" + +"Why? Because a sensitive girl, anxious to retain her future husband's +love, doesn't enjoy going about looking like something out of a dime +museum." + +"How absurd! Fillmore worships freckles." + +"Did he tell you so?" asked Miss Winch eagerly. + +"Not in so many words, but you can see it in his eye." + +"Well, he certainly asked me to marry him, knowing all about them, I +will say that. And, what's more, I don't think feminine loveliness means +much to Fillmore, or he'd never have picked on me. Still, it is +calculated to give a girl a jar, you must admit, when she picks up a +magazine and reads an advertisement of a face-cream beginning, 'Your +husband is growing cold to you. Can you blame him? Have you really tried +to cure those unsightly blemishes?'--meaning what I've got. Still, I +haven't noticed Fillmore growing cold to me, so maybe it's all right." + +It was a subdued Sally who received Ginger when he called at her +apartment a few days later on his return from Chicago. It seemed to her, +thinking over the recent scene, that matters were even worse than she +had feared. This absurd revue, which she had looked on as a mere +isolated outbreak of foolishness, was, it would appear, only a specimen +of the sort of thing her misguided brother proposed to do, a sample +selected at random from a wholesale lot of frantic schemes. Fillmore, +there was no longer any room for doubt, was preparing to express his +great soul on a vast scale. And she could not dissuade him. A +humiliating thought. She had grown so accustomed through the years to +being the dominating mind that this revolt from her authority made her +feel helpless and inadequate. Her self-confidence was shaken. + +And Bruce Carmyle was financing him... It was illogical, but Sally could +not help feeling that when--she had not the optimism to say "if"--he +lost his money, she would somehow be under an obligation to him, as if +the disaster had been her fault. She disliked, with a whole-hearted +intensity, the thought of being under an obligation to Mr. Carmyle. + +Ginger said he had looked in to inspect the furniture on the chance that +Sally might want it shifted again: but Sally had no criticisms to make +on that subject. Weightier matters occupied her mind. She sat Ginger +down in the armchair and started to pour out her troubles. It soothed +her to talk to him. In a world which had somehow become chaotic again +after an all too brief period of peace, he was solid and consoling. + +"I shouldn't worry," observed Ginger with Winch-like calm, when she had +finished drawing for him the picture of a Fillmore rampant against a +background of expensive revues. Sally nearly shook him. + +"It's all very well to tell me not to worry," she cried. "How can I +help worrying? Fillmore's simply a baby, and he's just playing the fool. +He has lost his head completely. And I can't stop him! That is the awful +part of it. I used to be able to look him in the eye, and he would wag +his tail and crawl back into his basket, but now I seem to have no +influence at all over him. He just snorts and goes on running round in +circles, breathing fire." + +Ginger did not abandon his attempts to indicate the silver lining. + +"I think you are making too much of all this, you know. I mean to say, +it's quite likely he's found some mug... what I mean is, it's just +possible that your brother isn't standing the entire racket himself. +Perhaps some rich Johnnie has breezed along with a pot of money. It +often happens like that, you know. You read in the paper that some +manager or other is putting on some show or other, when really the chap +who's actually supplying the pieces of eight is some anonymous lad in +the background." + +"That is just what has happened, and it makes it worse than ever. +Fillmore tells me that your cousin, Mr. Carmyle, is providing the +money." + +This did interest Ginger. He sat up with a jerk. + +"Oh, I say!" he exclaimed. + +"Yes," said Sally, still agitated but pleased that she had at last +shaken him out of his trying attitude of detachment. + +Ginger was scowling. + +"That's a bit off," he observed. + +"I think so, too." + +"I don't like that." + +"Nor do I." + +"Do you know what I think?" said Ginger, ever a man of plain speech and +a reckless plunger into delicate subjects. "The blighter's in love with +you." + +Sally flushed. After examining the evidence before her, she had reached +the same conclusion in the privacy of her thoughts, but it embarrassed +her to hear the thing put into bald words. + +"I know Bruce," continued Ginger, "and, believe me, he isn't the sort of +cove to take any kind of flutter without a jolly good motive. Of course, +he's got tons of money. His old guvnor was the Carmyle of Carmyle, Brent +& Co.--coal mines up in Wales, and all that sort of thing--and I +suppose he must have left Bruce something like half a million. No need +for the fellow to have worked at all, if he hadn't wanted to. As far as +having the stuff goes, he's in a position to back all the shows he wants +to. But the point is, it's right out of his line. He doesn't do that +sort of thing. Not a drop of sporting blood in the chap. Why I've known +him stick the whole family on to me just because it got noised about +that I'd dropped a couple of quid on the Grand National. If he's really +brought himself to the point of shelling out on a risky proposition like +a show, it means something, take my word for it. And I don't see what +else it can mean except... well, I mean to say, is it likely that he's +doing it simply to make your brother look on him as a good egg and a +pal, and all that sort of thing?" + +"No, it's not," agreed Sally. "But don't let's talk about it any more. +Tell me all about your trip to Chicago." + +"All right. But, returning to this binge for a moment, I don't see how +it matters to you one way or the other. You're engaged to another +fellow, and when Bruce rolls up and says: 'What about it?' you've simply +to tell him that the shot isn't on the board and will he kindly melt +away. Then you hand him his hat and out he goes." + +Sally gave a troubled laugh. + +"You think that's simple, do you? I suppose you imagine that a girl +enjoys that sort of thing? Oh, what's the use of talking about it? It's +horrible, and no amount of arguing will make it anything else. Do let's +change the subject. How did you like Chicago?" + +"Oh, all right. Rather a grubby sort of place." + +"So I've always heard. But you ought not to mind that, being a +Londoner." + +"Oh, I didn't mind it. As a matter of fact, I had rather a good time. +Saw one or two shows, you know. Got in on my face as your brother's +representative, which was all to the good. By the way, it's rummy how +you run into people when you move about, isn't it?" + +"You talk as if you had been dashing about the streets with your eyes +shut. Did you meet somebody you knew?" + +"Chap I hadn't seen for years. Was at school with him, as a matter of +fact. Fellow named Foster. But I expect you know him, too, don't you? By +name, at any rate. He wrote your brother's show." + +Sally's heart jumped. + +"Oh! Did you meet Gerald--Foster?" + +"Ran into him one night at the theatre." + +"And you were really at school with him?" + +"Yes. He was in the footer team with me my last year." + +"Was he a scrum-half, too?" asked Sally, dimpling. + +Ginger looked shocked. + +"You don't have two scrum-halves in a team," he said, pained at this +ignorance on a vital matter. "The scrum-half is the half who works the +scrum and..." + +"Yes, you told me that at Roville. What was Gerald--Mr. Foster then? A +six and seven-eighths, or something?" + +"He was a wing-three," said Ginger with a gravity befitting his theme. +"Rather fast, with a fairly decent swerve. But he would not learn to +give the reverse pass inside to the centre." + +"Ghastly!" said Sally. + +"If," said Ginger earnestly, "a wing's bottled up by his wing and the +back, the only thing he can do, if he doesn't want to be bundled into +touch, is to give the reverse pass." + +"I know," said Sally. "If I've thought that once, I've thought it a +hundred times. How nice it must have been for you meeting again. I +suppose you had all sorts of things to talk about?" + +Ginger shook his head. + +"Not such a frightful lot. We were never very thick. You see, this +chap Foster was by way of being a bit of a worm." + +"What!" + +"A tick," explained Ginger. "A rotter. He was pretty generally barred +at school. Personally, I never had any use for him at all." + +Sally stiffened. She had liked Ginger up to that moment, and later on, +no doubt, she would resume her liking for him: but in the immediate +moment which followed these words she found herself regarding him with +stormy hostility. How dare he sit there saying things like that about +Gerald? + +Ginger, who was lighting a cigarette without a care in the world, +proceeded to develop his theme. + +"It's a rummy thing about school. Generally, if a fellow's good at +games--in the cricket team or the footer team and so forth--he can +hardly help being fairly popular. But this blighter Foster +somehow--nobody seemed very keen on him. Of course, he had a few of his +own pals, but most of the chaps rather gave him a miss. It may have been +because he was a bit sidey... had rather an edge on him, you know... +Personally, the reason I barred him was because he wasn't straight. You +didn't notice it if you weren't thrown a goodish bit with him, of +course, but he and I were in the same house, and..." + +Sally managed to control her voice, though it shook a little. + +"I ought to tell you," she said, and her tone would have warned him had +he been less occupied, "that Mr. Foster is a great friend of mine." + +But Ginger was intent on the lighting of his cigarette, a delicate +operation with the breeze blowing in through the open window. His head +was bent, and he had formed his hands into a protective framework which +half hid his face. + +"If you take my tip," he mumbled, "you'll drop him. He's a wrong 'un." + +He spoke with the absent-minded drawl of preoccupation, and Sally could +keep the conflagration under no longer. She was aflame from head to +foot. + +"It may interest you to know," she said, shooting the words out like +bullets from between clenched teeth, "that Gerald Foster is the man I am +engaged to marry." + +Ginger's head came slowly up from his cupped hands. Amazement was in +his eyes, and a sort of horror. The cigarette hung limply from his +mouth. He did not speak, but sat looking at her, dazed. Then the match +burnt his fingers, and he dropped it with a start. The sharp sting of it +seemed to wake him. He blinked. + +"You're joking," he said, feebly. There was a note of wistfulness in +his voice. "It isn't true?" + +Sally kicked the leg of her chair irritably. She read insolent +disapproval into the words. He was daring to criticize... + +"Of course it's true..." + +"But..." A look of hopeless misery came into Ginger's pleasant face. He +hesitated. Then, with the air of a man bracing himself to a dreadful, +but unavoidable, ordeal, he went on. He spoke gruffly, and his eyes, +which had been fixed on Sally's, wandered down to the match on the +carpet. It was still glowing, and mechanically he put a foot on it. + +"Foster's married," he said shortly. "He was married the day before I +left Chicago." + + + +3 + + + +It seemed to Ginger that in the silence which followed, brooding over +the room like a living presence, even the noises in the street had +ceased, as though what he had said had been a spell cutting Sally and +himself off from the outer world. Only the little clock on the +mantelpiece ticked--ticked--ticked, like a heart beating fast. + +He stared straight before him, conscious of a strange rigidity. He felt +incapable of movement, as he had sometimes felt in nightmares; and not +for all the wealth of America could he have raised his eyes just then to +Sally's face. He could see her hands. They had tightened on the arm of +the chair. The knuckles were white. + +He was blaming himself bitterly now for his oafish clumsiness in +blurting out the news so abruptly. And yet, curiously, in his remorse +there was something of elation. Never before had he felt so near to her. +It was as though a barrier that had been between them had fallen. + +Something moved... It was Sally's hand, slowly relaxing. The fingers +loosened their grip, tightened again, then, as if reluctantly relaxed +once more. The blood flowed back. + +"Your cigarette's out." + +Ginger started violently. Her voice, coming suddenly out of the +silence, had struck him like a blow. + +"Oh, thanks!" + +He forced himself to light another match. It sputtered noisily in the +stillness. He blew it out, and the uncanny quiet fell again. + +Ginger drew at his cigarette mechanically. For an instant he had seen +Sally's face, white-cheeked and bright-eyed, the chin tilted like a flag +flying over a stricken field. His mood changed. All his emotions had +crystallized into a dull, futile rage, a helpless fury directed at a man +a thousand miles away. + +Sally spoke again. Her voice sounded small and far off, an odd flatness +in it. + +"Married?" + +Ginger threw his cigarette out of the window. He was shocked to find +that he was smoking. Nothing could have been farther from his intention +than to smoke. He nodded. + +"Whom has he married?" + +Ginger coughed. Something was sticking in his throat, and speech was +difficult. + +"A girl called Doland." + +"Oh, Elsa Doland?" + +"Yes." + +"Elsa Doland." Sally drummed with her fingers on the arm of the chair. +"Oh, Elsa Doland?" + +There was silence again. The little clock ticked fussily on the +mantelpiece. Out in the street automobile horns were blowing. From +somewhere in the distance came faintly the rumble of an elevated train. +Familiar sounds, but they came to Sally now with a curious, unreal sense +of novelty. She felt as though she had been projected into another world +where everything was new and strange and horrible--everything except +Ginger. About him, in the mere sight of him, there was something known +and heartening. + +Suddenly, she became aware that she was feeling that Ginger was behaving +extremely well. She seemed to have been taken out of herself and to be +regarding the scene from outside, regarding it coolly and critically; +and it was plain to her that Ginger, in this upheaval of all things, was +bearing himself perfectly. He had attempted no banal words of sympathy. +He had said nothing and he was not looking at her. And Sally felt that +sympathy just now would be torture, and that she could not have borne to +be looked at. + +Ginger was wonderful. In that curious, detached spirit that had come +upon her, she examined him impartially, and gratitude welled up from the +very depths of her. There he sat, saying nothing and doing nothing, as +if he knew that all she needed, the only thing that could keep her sane +in this world of nightmare, was the sight of that dear, flaming head of +his that made her feel that the world had not slipped away from her +altogether. + +Ginger did not move. The room had grown almost dark now. A spear of +light from a street lamp shone in through the window. + +Sally got up abruptly. Slowly, gradually, inch by inch, the great +suffocating cloud which had been crushing her had lifted. She felt alive +again. Her black hour had gone, and she was back in the world of living +things once more. She was afire with a fierce, tearing pain that +tormented her almost beyond endurance, but dimly she sensed the fact +that she had passed through something that was worse than pain, and, +with Ginger's stolid presence to aid her, had passed triumphantly. + +"Go and have dinner, Ginger," she said. "You must be starving." + +Ginger came to life like a courtier in the palace of the Sleeping +Beauty. He shook himself, and rose stiffly from his chair. + +"Oh, no," he said. "Not a bit, really." + +Sally switched on the light and set him blinking. She could bear to be +looked at now. + +"Go and dine," she said. "Dine lavishly and luxuriously. You've +certainly earned..." Her voice faltered for a moment. She held out her +hand. "Ginger," she said shakily, "I... Ginger, you're a pal." + +When he had gone. Sally sat down and began to cry. Then she dried her +eyes in a business-like manner. + +"There, Miss Nicholas!" she said. "You couldn't have done that an hour +ago... We will now boil you an egg for your dinner and see how that +suits you!" + + + + + + + + + +CHAPTER XI + + + +SALLY RUNS AWAY + + + +If Ginger Kemp had been asked to enumerate his good qualities, it is not +probable that he would have drawn up a very lengthy list. He might have +started by claiming for himself the virtue of meaning well, but after +that he would have had to chew the pencil in prolonged meditation. And, +even if he could eventually have added one or two further items to the +catalogue, tact and delicacy of feeling would not have been among them. + +Yet, by staying away from Sally during the next few days he showed +considerable delicacy. It was not easy to stay away from her, but he +forced himself to do so. He argued from his own tastes, and was strongly +of opinion that in times of travail, solitude was what the sufferer most +desired. In his time he, too, had had what he would have described as +nasty jars, and on these occasions all he had asked was to be allowed to +sit and think things over and fight his battle out by himself. + +By Saturday, however, he had come to the conclusion that some form of +action might now be taken. Saturday was rather a good day for picking up +the threads again. He had not to go to the office, and, what was still +more to the point, he had just drawn his week's salary. Mrs. Meecher had +deftly taken a certain amount of this off him, but enough remained to +enable him to attempt consolation on a fairly princely scale. There +presented itself to him as a judicious move the idea of hiring a car and +taking Sally out to dinner at one of the road-houses he had heard about +up the Boston Post Road. He examined the scheme. The more he looked at +it, the better it seemed. + +He was helped to this decision by the extraordinary perfection of the +weather. The weather of late had been a revelation to Ginger. It was his +first experience of America's Indian Summer, and it had quite overcome +him. As he stood on the roof of Mrs. Meecher's establishment on the +Saturday morning, thrilled by the velvet wonder of the sunshine, it +seemed to him that the only possible way of passing such a day was to +take Sally for a ride in an open car. + +The Maison Meecher was a lofty building on one of the side-streets at +the lower end of the avenue. From its roof, after you had worked your +way through the groves of washing which hung limply from the +clothes-line, you could see many things of interest. To the left lay +Washington Square, full of somnolent Italians and roller-skating +children; to the right was a spectacle which never failed to intrigue +Ginger, the high smoke-stacks of a Cunard liner moving slowly down the +river, sticking up over the house-tops as if the boat was travelling +down Ninth Avenue. + +To-day there were four of these funnels, causing Ginger to deduce the +Mauritania. As the boat on which he had come over from England, the +Mauritania had a sentimental interest for him. He stood watching her +stately progress till the higher buildings farther down the town shut +her from his sight; then picked his way through the washing and went +down to his room to get his hat. A quarter of an hour later he was in +the hall-way of Sally's apartment house, gazing with ill-concealed +disgust at the serge-clad back of his cousin Mr. Carmyle, who was +engaged in conversation with a gentleman in overalls. + +No care-free prospector, singing his way through the Mojave Desert and +suddenly finding himself confronted by a rattlesnake, could have +experienced so abrupt a change of mood as did Ginger at this revolting +spectacle. Even in their native Piccadilly it had been unpleasant to run +into Mr. Carmyle. To find him here now was nothing short of nauseating. +Only one thing could have brought him to this place. Obviously, he must +have come to see Sally; and with a sudden sinking of the heart Ginger +remembered the shiny, expensive automobile which he had seen waiting at +the door. He, it was clear, was not the only person to whom the idea had +occurred of taking Sally for a drive on this golden day. + +He was still standing there when Mr. Carmyle swung round with a frown on +his dark face which seemed to say that he had not found the janitor's +conversation entertaining. The sight of Ginger plainly did nothing to +lighten his gloom. + +"Hullo!" he said. + +"Hullo!" said Ginger. + +Uncomfortable silence followed these civilities. + +"Have you come to see Miss Nicholas?" + +"Why, yes." + +"She isn't here," said Mr. Carmyle, and the fact that he had found +someone to share the bad news, seemed to cheer him a little. + +"Not here?" + +"No. Apparently..." Bruce Carmyle's scowl betrayed that resentment +which a well-balanced man cannot but feel at the unreasonableness of +others. "... Apparently, for some extraordinary reason, she has taken it +into her head to dash over to England." + +Ginger tottered. The unexpectedness of the blow was crushing. He +followed his cousin out into the sunshine in a sort of dream. Bruce +Carmyle was addressing the driver of the expensive automobile. + +"I find I shall not want the car. You can take it back to the garage." + +The chauffeur, a moody man, opened one half-closed eye and spat +cautiously. It was the way Rockefeller would have spat when approaching +the crisis of some delicate financial negotiation. + +"You'll have to pay just the same," he observed, opening his other eye +to lend emphasis to the words. + +"Of course I shall pay," snapped Mr. Carmyle, irritably. "How much is +it?" + +Money passed. The car rolled off. + +"Gone to England?" said Ginger, dizzily. + +"Yes, gone to England." + +"But why?" + +"How the devil do I know why?" Bruce Carmyle would have found his best +friend trying at this moment. Gaping Ginger gave him almost a physical +pain. "All I know is what the janitor told me, that she sailed on the +Mauretania this morning." + +The tragic irony of this overcame Ginger. That he should have stood on +the roof, calmly watching the boat down the river... + +He nodded absently to Mr. Carmyle and walked off. He had no further +remarks to make. The warmth had gone out of the sunshine and all +interest had departed from his life. He felt dull, listless, at a loose +end. Not even the thought that his cousin, a careful man with his money, +had had to pay a day's hire for a car which he could not use brought him +any balm. He loafed aimlessly about the streets. He wandered in the Park +and out again. The Park bored him. The streets bored him. The whole city +bored him. A city without Sally in it was a drab, futile city, and +nothing that the sun could do to brighten it could make it otherwise. + +Night came at last, and with it a letter. It was the first even +passably pleasant thing that had happened to Ginger in the whole of this +dreary and unprofitable day: for the envelope bore the crest of the good +ship Mauretania. He snatched it covetously from the letter-rack, and +carried it upstairs to his room. + +Very few of the rooms at Mrs. Meecher's boarding-house struck any note +of luxury. Mrs. Meecher was not one of your fashionable interior +decorators. She considered that when she had added a Morris chair to the +essentials which make up a bedroom, she had gone as far in the direction +of pomp as any guest at seven-and-a-half per could expect her to go. As +a rule, the severity of his surroundings afflicted Ginger with a touch +of gloom when he went to bed; but to-night--such is the magic of a +letter from the right person--he was uplifted and almost gay. There are +moments when even illuminated texts over the wash-stand cannot wholly +quell us. + +There was nothing of haste and much of ceremony in Ginger's method of +approaching the perusal of his correspondence. He bore himself after +the manner of a small boy in the presence of unexpected ice-cream, +gloating for awhile before embarking on the treat, anxious to make it +last out. His first move was to feel in the breast-pocket of his coat +and produce the photograph of Sally which he had feloniously removed +from her apartment. At this he looked long and earnestly before propping +it up within easy reach against his basin, to be handy, if required, for +purposes of reference. He then took off his coat, collar, and shoes, +filled and lit a pipe, placed pouch and matches on the arm of the Morris +chair, and drew that chair up so that he could sit with his feet on the +bed. Having manoeuvred himself into a position of ease, he lit his pipe +again and took up the letter. He looked at the crest, the handwriting of +the address, and the postmark. He weighed it in his hand. It was a +bulky letter. + +He took Sally's photograph from the wash-stand and scrutinized it once +more. Then he lit his pipe again, and, finally, wriggling himself into +the depths of the chair, opened the envelope. + +"Ginger, dear." + +Having read so far, Ginger found it necessary to take up the photograph +and study it with an even greater intentness than before. He gazed at it +for many minutes, then laid it down and lit his pipe again. Then he went +on with the letter. + +"Ginger, dear--I'm afraid this address is going to give you rather a +shock, and I'm feeling very guilty. I'm running away, and I haven't even +stopped to say good-bye. I can't help it. I know it's weak and cowardly, +but I simply can't help it. I stood it for a day or two, and then I saw +that it was no good. (Thank you for leaving me alone and not coming +round to see me. Nobody else but you would have done that. But then, +nobody ever has been or ever could be so understanding as you.)" + +Ginger found himself compelled at this point to look at the photograph +again. + +"There was too much in New York to remind me. That's the worst of being +happy in a place. When things go wrong you find there are too many +ghosts about. I just couldn't stand it. I tried, but I couldn't. I'm +going away to get cured--if I can. Mr. Faucitt is over in England, and +when I went down to Mrs. Meecher for my letters, I found one from him. +His brother is dead, you know, and he has inherited, of all things, a +fashionable dress-making place in Regent Street. His brother was +Laurette et Cie. I suppose he will sell the business later on, but, just +at present, the poor old dear is apparently quite bewildered and that +doesn't seem to have occurred to him. He kept saying in his letter how +much he wished I was with him, to help him, and I was tempted and ran. +Anything to get away from the ghosts and have something to do. I don't +suppose I shall feel much better in England, but, at least, every street +corner won't have associations. Don't ever be happy anywhere, Ginger. +It's too big a risk, much too big a risk. + +"There was a letter from Elsa Doland, too. Bubbling over with +affection. We had always been tremendous friends. Of course, she never +knew anything about my being engaged to Gerald. I lent Fillmore the +money to buy that piece, which gave Elsa her first big chance, and so +she's very grateful. She says, if ever she gets the opportunity of doing +me a good turn... Aren't things muddled? + +"And there was a letter from Gerald. I was expecting one, of course, +but... what would you have done, Ginger? Would you have read it? I sat +with it in front of me for an hour, I should think, just looking at the +envelope, and then... You see, what was the use? I could guess exactly +the sort of thing that would be in it, and reading it would only have +hurt a lot more. The thing was done, so why bother about explanations? +What good are explanations, anyway? They don't help. They don't do +anything... I burned it, Ginger. The last letter I shall ever get from +him. I made a bonfire on the bathroom floor, and it smouldered and went +brown, and then flared a little, and every now and then I lit another +match and kept it burning, and at last it was just black ashes and a +stain on the tiles. Just a mess! + +"Ginger, burn this letter, too. I'm pouring out all the poison to you, +hoping it will make me feel better. You don't mind, do you? But I know +you don't. If ever anybody had a real pal... + +"It's a dreadful thing, fascination, Ginger. It grips you and you are +helpless. One can be so sensible and reasonable about other people's +love affairs. When I was working at the dance place I told you about +there was a girl who fell in love with the most awful little beast. He +had a mean mouth and shiny black hair brushed straight back, and +anybody would have seen what he was. But this girl wouldn't listen to a +word. I talked to her by the hour. It makes me smile now when I think +how sensible and level-headed I was. But she wouldn't listen. In some +mysterious way this was the man she wanted, and, of course, everything +happened that one knew would happen. + +"If one could manage one's own life as well as one can manage other +people's! If all this wretched thing of mine had happened to some other +girl, how beautifully I could have proved that it was the best thing +that could have happened, and that a man who could behave as Gerald has +done wasn't worth worrying about. I can just hear myself. But, you see, +whatever he has done, Gerald is still Gerald and Sally is still Sally +and, however much I argue, I can't get away from that. All I can do is +to come howling to my redheaded pal, when I know just as well as he +does that a girl of any spirit would be dignified and keep her troubles +to herself and be much too proud to let anyone know that she was hurt. + +"Proud! That's the real trouble, Ginger. My pride has been battered and +chopped up and broken into as many pieces as you broke Mr. Scrymgeour's +stick! What pitiful creatures we are. Girls, I mean. At least, I suppose +a good many girls are like me. If Gerald had died and I had lost him +that way, I know quite well I shouldn't be feeling as I do now. I should +have been broken-hearted, but it wouldn't have been the same. It's my +pride that is hurt. I have always been a bossy, cocksure little +creature, swaggering about the world like an English sparrow; and now +I'm paying for it! Oh, Ginger, I'm paying for it! I wonder if running +away is going to do me any good at all. Perhaps, if Mr. Faucitt has some +real hard work for me to do... + +"Of course, I know exactly how all this has come about. Elsa's pretty +and attractive. But the point is that she is a success, and as a success +she appeals to Gerald's weakest side. He worships success. She is going +to have a marvellous career, and she can help Gerald on in his. He can +write plays for her to star in. What have I to offer against that? Yes, +I know it's grovelling and contemptible of me to say that, Ginger. I +ought to be above it, oughtn't I--talking as if I were competing for +some prize... But I haven't any pride left. Oh, well! + +"There! I've poured it all out and I really do feel a little better just +for the moment. It won't last, of course, but even a minute is +something. Ginger, dear, I shan't see you for ever so long, even if we +ever do meet again, but you'll try to remember that I'm thinking of you +a whole lot, won't you? I feel responsible for you. You're my baby. +You've got started now and you've only to stick to it. Please, please, +please don't 'make a hash of it'! Good-bye. I never did find that +photograph of me that we were looking for that afternoon in the +apartment, or I would send it to you. Then you could have kept it on +your mantelpiece, and whenever you felt inclined to make a hash of +anything I would have caught your eye sternly and you would have pulled +up. + +"Good-bye, Ginger. I shall have to stop now. The mail is just closing. + +"Always your pal, wherever I am.---SALLY." + +Ginger laid the letter down, and a little sound escaped him that was +half a sigh, half an oath. He was wondering whether even now some +desirable end might not be achieved by going to Chicago and breaking +Gerald Foster's neck. Abandoning this scheme as impracticable, and not +being able to think of anything else to do he re-lit his pipe and +started to read the letter again. + + + + + + + +CHAPTER XII + + + +SOME LETTERS FOR GINGER + + + +Laurette et Cie, + +Regent Street, + +London, W., + +England. + + + +January 21st. + +Dear Ginger,--I'm feeling better. As it's three months since I last +wrote to you, no doubt you will say to yourself that I would be a poor, +weak-minded creature if I wasn't. I suppose one ought to be able to get +over anything in three months. Unfortunately, I'm afraid I haven't +quite succeeded in doing that, but at least I have managed to get my +troubles stowed away in the cellar, and I'm not dragging them out and +looking at them all the time. That's something, isn't it? + +I ought to give you all my impressions of London, I suppose; but I've +grown so used to the place that I don't think I have any now. I seem to +have been here years and years. + +You will see by the address that Mr. Faucitt has not yet sold his +inheritance. He expects to do so very soon, he tells me--there is a +rich-looking man with whiskers and a keen eye whom he is always lunching +with, and I think big deals are in progress. Poor dear! he is crazy to +get away into the country and settle down and grow ducks and things. +London has disappointed him. It is not the place it used to be. Until +quite lately, when he grew resigned, he used to wander about in a +disconsolate sort of way, trying to locate the landmarks of his youth. +(He has not been in England for nearly thirty years!) The trouble is, it +seems, that about once in every thirty years a sort of craze for change +comes over London, and they paint a shop-front red instead of blue, and +that upsets the returned exile dreadfully. Mr. Faucitt feels like Rip +Van Winkle. His first shock was when he found that the Empire was a +theatre now instead of a music-hall. Then he was told that another +music-hall, the Tivoli, had been pulled down altogether. And when on top +of that he went to look at the baker's shop in Rupert Street, over which +he had lodgings in the eighties, and discovered that it had been turned +into a dressmaker's, he grew very melancholy, and only cheered up a +little when a lovely magenta fog came on and showed him that some things +were still going along as in the good old days. + +I am kept quite busy at Laurette et Cie., thank goodness. (Not being a +French scholar like you--do you remember Jules?--I thought at first that +Cie was the name of the junior partner, and looked forward to meeting +him. "Miss Nicholas, shake hands with Mr. Cie, one of your greatest +admirers.") I hold down the female equivalent of your job at the +Fillmore Nicholas Theatrical Enterprises Ltd.--that is to say, I'm a +sort of right-hand woman. I hang around and sidle up to the customers +when they come in, and say, "Chawming weather, moddom!" (which is +usually a black lie) and pass them on to the staff, who do the actual +work. I shouldn't mind going on like this for the next few years, but +Mr. Faucitt is determined to sell. I don't know if you are like that, +but every other Englishman I've ever met seems to have an ambition to +own a house and lot in Loamshire or Hants or Salop or somewhere. Their +one object in life is to make some money and "buy back the old place"-- +which was sold, of course, at the end of act one to pay the heir's +gambling debts. + +Mr. Faucitt, when he was a small boy, used to live in a little village +in Gloucestershire, near a place called Cirencester--at least, it isn't: +it's called Cissister, which I bet you didn't know--and after forgetting +about it for fifty years, he has suddenly been bitten by the desire to +end his days there, surrounded by pigs and chickens. He took me down to +see the place the other day. Oh, Ginger, this English country! Why any +of you ever live in towns I can't think. Old, old grey stone houses with +yellow haystacks and lovely squelchy muddy lanes and great fat trees and +blue hills in the distance. The peace of it! If ever I sell my soul, I +shall insist on the devil giving me at least forty years in some English +country place in exchange. + +Perhaps you will think from all this that I am too much occupied to +remember your existence. Just to show how interested I am in you, let me +tell you that, when I was reading the paper a week ago, I happened to +see the headline, "International Match." It didn't seem to mean anything +at first, and then I suddenly recollected. This was the thing you had +once been a snip for! So I went down to a place called Twickenham, where +this football game was to be, to see the sort of thing you used to do +before I took charge of you and made you a respectable right-hand man. +There was an enormous crowd there, and I was nearly squeezed to death, +but I bore it for your sake. I found out that the English team were the +ones wearing white shirts, and that the ones in red were the Welsh. I +said to the man next to me, after he had finished yelling himself black +in the face, "Could you kindly inform me which is the English +scrum-half?" And just at that moment the players came quite near where I +was, and about a dozen assassins in red hurled themselves violently on +top of a meek-looking little fellow who had just fallen on the ball. +Ginger, you are well out of it! That was the scrum-half, and I gathered +that that sort of thing was a mere commonplace in his existence. +Stopping a rush, it is called, and he is expected to do it all the time. +The idea of you ever going in for such brutal sports! You thank your +stars that you are safe on your little stool in Fillmore's outer office, +and that, if anybody jumps on top of you now, you can call a cop. Do you +mean to say you really used to do these daredevil feats? You must have +hidden depths in you which I have never suspected. + +As I was taking a ride down Piccadilly the other day on top of a bus, I +saw somebody walking along who seemed familiar. It was Mr. Carmyle. So +he's back in England again. He didn't see me, thank goodness. I don't +want to meet anybody just at present who reminds me of New York. + +Thanks for telling me all the news, but please don't do it again. It +makes me remember, and I don't want to. It's this way, Ginger. Let me +write to you, because it really does relieve me, but don't answer my +letters. Do you mind? I'm sure you'll understand. + +So Fillmore and Gladys Winch are married! From what I have seen of her, +it's the best thing that has ever happened to Brother F. She is a +splendid girl. I must write to him... + + + +Laurette et Cie.. + +London + + + +March 12th. + +Dear Ginger,--I saw in a Sunday paper last week that "The Primrose Way" +had been produced in New York, and was a great success. Well, I'm very +glad. But I don't think the papers ought to print things like that. It's +unsettling. + +Next day, I did one of those funny things you do when you're feeling +blue and lonely and a long way away from everybody. I called at your +club and asked for you! Such a nice old man in uniform at the desk said +in a fatherly way that you hadn't been in lately, and he rather fancied +you were out of town, but would I take a seat while he inquired. He then +summoned a tiny boy, also in uniform, and the child skipped off +chanting, "Mister Kemp! Mister Kemp!" in a shrill treble. It gave me +such an odd feeling to hear your name echoing in the distance. I felt so +ashamed for giving them all that trouble; and when the boy came back I +slipped twopence into his palm, which I suppose was against all the +rules, though he seemed to like it. + +Mr. Faucitt has sold the business and retired to the country, and I am +rather at a loose end... + + + + Monk's Crofton, + (whatever that means) + Much Middleford, + Salop, + (slang for Shropshire) + England. + + + +April 18th. + +Dear Ginger,--What's the use? What is the use? I do all I can to get +right away from New York, and New York comes after me and tracks me down +in my hiding-place. A week or so ago, as I was walking down the Strand +in an aimless sort of way, out there came right on top of me--who do +you think? Fillmore, arm in arm with Mr. Carmyle! I couldn't dodge. In +the first place, Mr. Carmyle had seen me; in the second place, it is a +day's journey to dodge poor dear Fillmore now. I blushed for him. +Ginger! Right there in the Strand I blushed for him. In my worst dreams +I had never pictured him so enormous. Upon what meat doth this our +Fillmore feed that he is grown so great? Poor Gladys! When she looks at +him she must feel like a bigamist. + +Apparently Fillmore is still full of big schemes, for he talked airily +about buying all sorts of English plays. He has come over, as I suppose +you know, to arrange about putting on "The Primrose Way" over here. He +is staying at the Savoy, and they took me off there to lunch, whooping +joyfully as over a strayed lamb. It was the worst thing that could +possibly have happened to me. Fillmore talked Broadway without a pause, +till by the time he had worked his way past the French pastry and was +lolling back, breathing a little stertorously, waiting for the coffee +and liqueurs, he had got me so homesick that, if it hadn't been that I +didn't want to make a public exhibition of myself, I should have broken +down and howled. It was crazy of me ever to go near the Savoy. Of +course, it's simply an annex to Broadway. There were Americans at every +table as far as the eye could reach. I might just as well have been at +the Astor. + +Well, if Fate insists in bringing New York to England for my special +discomfiture, I suppose I have got to put up with it. I just let events +take their course, and I have been drifting ever since. Two days ago I +drifted here. Mr. Carmyle invited Fillmore--he seems to love +Fillmore--and me to Monk's Crofton, and I hadn't even the shadow of an +excuse for refusing. So I came, and I am now sitting writing to you in +an enormous bedroom with an open fire and armchairs and every other sort +of luxury. Fillmore is out golfing. He sails for New York on Saturday on +the Mauretania. I am horrified to hear from him that, in addition to all +his other big schemes, he is now promoting a fight for the light-weight +championship in Jersey City, and guaranteeing enormous sums to both +boxers. It's no good arguing with him. If you do, he simply quotes +figures to show the fortunes other people have made out of these things. +Besides, it's too late now, anyway. As far as I can make out, the fight +is going to take place in another week or two. All the same, it makes my +flesh creep. + +Well, it's no use worrying, I suppose. Let's change the subject. Do +you know Monk's Crofton? Probably you don't, as I seem to remember +hearing something said about it being a recent purchase. Mr. Carmyle +bought it from some lord or other who had been losing money on the Stock +Exchange. I hope you haven't seen it, anyway, because I want to +describe it at great length. I want to pour out my soul about it. +Ginger, what has England ever done to deserve such paradises? I thought, +in my ignorance, that Mr. Faucitt's Cissister place was pretty good, but +it doesn't even begin. It can't compete. Of course, his is just an +ordinary country house, and this is a Seat. Monk's Crofton is the sort +of place they used to write about in the English novels. You know. "The +sunset was falling on the walls of G---- Castle, in B----shire, hard by +the picturesque village of H----, and not a stone's throw from the +hamlet of J----." I can imagine Tennyson's Maud living here. It is one +of the stately homes of England; how beautiful they stand, and I'm crazy +about it. + +You motor up from the station, and after you have gone about three +miles, you turn in at a big iron gate with stone posts on each side with +stone beasts on them. Close by the gate is the cutest little house with +an old man inside it who pops out and touches his hat. This is only the +lodge, really, but you think you have arrived; so you get all ready to +jump out, and then the car goes rolling on for another fifty miles or so +through beech woods full of rabbits and open meadows with deer in them. +Finally, just as you think you are going on for ever, you whizz round a +corner, and there's the house. You don't get a glimpse of it till then, +because the trees are too thick. + +It's very large, and sort of low and square, with a kind of tower at one +side and the most fascinating upper porch sort of thing with +battlements. I suppose in the old days you used to stand on this and +drop molten lead on visitors' heads. Wonderful lawns all round, and +shrubberies and a lake that you can just see where the ground dips +beyond the fields. Of course it's too early yet for them to be out, but +to the left of the house there's a place where there will be about a +million roses when June comes round, and all along the side of the +rose-garden is a high wall of old red brick which shuts off the kitchen +garden. I went exploring there this morning. It's an enormous place, +with hot-houses and things, and there's the cunningest farm at one end +with a stable yard full of puppies that just tear the heart out of you, +they're so sweet. And a big, sleepy cat, which sits and blinks in the +sun and lets the puppies run all over her. And there's a lovely +stillness, and you can hear everything growing. And thrushes and +blackbirds... Oh, Ginger, it's heavenly! + +But there's a catch. It's a case of "Where every prospect pleases and +only man is vile." At least, not exactly vile, I suppose, but terribly +stodgy. I can see now why you couldn't hit it off with the Family. +Because I've seen 'em all! They're here! Yes, Uncle Donald and all of +them. Is it a habit of your family to collect in gangs, or have I just +happened to stumble into an accidental Old Home Week? When I came down +to dinner the first evening, the drawing-room was full to bursting +point--not simply because Fillmore was there, but because there were +uncles and aunts all over the place. I felt like a small lion in a den +of Daniels. I know exactly now what you mean about the Family. They look +at you! Of course, it's all right for me, because I am snowy white clear +through, but I can just imagine what it must have been like for you with +your permanently guilty conscience. You must have had an awful time. + +By the way, it's going to be a delicate business getting this letter +through to you--rather like carrying the despatches through the enemy's +lines in a Civil War play. You're supposed to leave letters on the table +in the hall, and someone collects them in the afternoon and takes them +down to the village on a bicycle. But, if I do that some aunt or uncle +is bound to see it, and I shall be an object of loathing, for it is no +light matter, my lad, to be caught having correspondence with a human +Jimpson weed like you. It would blast me socially. At least, so I gather +from the way they behaved when your name came up at dinner last night. +Somebody mentioned you, and the most awful roasting party broke loose. +Uncle Donald acting as cheer-leader. I said feebly that I had met you +and had found you part human, and there was an awful silence till they +all started at the same time to show me where I was wrong, and how +cruelly my girlish inexperience had deceived me. A young and innocent +half-portion like me, it appears, is absolutely incapable of suspecting +the true infamy of the dregs of society. You aren't fit to speak to the +likes of me, being at the kindest estimate little more than a blot on +the human race. I tell you this in case you may imagine you're popular +with the Family. You're not. + +So I shall have to exercise a good deal of snaky craft in smuggling this +letter through. I'll take it down to the village myself if I can sneak +away. But it's going to be pretty difficult, because for some reason I +seem to be a centre of attraction. Except when I take refuge in my room, +hardly a moment passes without an aunt or an uncle popping out and +having a cosy talk with me. It sometimes seems as though they were +weighing me in the balance. Well, let 'em weigh! + +Time to dress for dinner now. Good-bye. + +Yours in the balance, + +sally. + +P.S.--You were perfectly right about your Uncle Donald's moustache, but +I don't agree with you that it is more his misfortune than his fault. I +think he does it on purpose. + + + + (Just for the moment) + Monk's Crofton, + Much Middleford, + Salop, + England. + + + +April 20th. + +Dear Ginger,--Leaving here to-day. In disgrace. Hard, cold looks from +the family. Strained silences. Uncle Donald far from chummy. You can +guess what has happened. I might have seen it coming. I can see now that +it was in the air all along. + +Fillmore knows nothing about it. He left just before it happened. I +shall see him very soon, for I have decided to come back and stop +running away from things any longer. It's cowardly to skulk about over +here. Besides, I'm feeling so much better that I believe I can face the +ghosts. Anyway, I'm going to try. See you almost as soon as you get +this. + +I shall mail this in London, and I suppose it will come over by the same +boat as me. It's hardly worth writing, really, of course, but I have +sneaked up to my room to wait till the motor arrives to take me to the +station, and it's something to do. I can hear muffled voices. The +Family talking me over, probably. Saying they never really liked me all +along. Oh, well! + +Yours moving in an orderly manner to the exit, + +sally. + + + + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + + + +STRANGE BEHAVIOUR OF A SPARRING-PARTNER + + + +1 + + + +Sally's emotions, as she sat in her apartment on the morning of her +return to New York, resembled somewhat those of a swimmer who, after +wavering on a raw morning at the brink of a chill pool, nerves himself +to the plunge. She was aching, but she knew that she had done well. If +she wanted happiness, she must fight for it, and for all these months +she had been shirking the fight. She had done with wavering on the +brink, and here she was, in mid-stream, ready for whatever might befall. +It hurt, this coming to grips. She had expected it to hurt. But it was a +pain that stimulated, not a dull melancholy that smothered. She felt +alive and defiant. + +She had finished unpacking and tidying up. The next move was certainly +to go and see Ginger. She had suddenly become aware that she wanted very +badly to see Ginger. His stolid friendliness would be a support and a +prop. She wished now that she had sent him a cable, so that he could +have met her at the dock. It had been rather terrible at the dock. The +echoing customs sheds had sapped her valour and she felt alone and +forlorn. + +She looked at her watch, and was surprised to find how early it was. +She could catch him at the office and make him take her out to lunch. +She put on her hat and went out. + +The restless hand of change, always active in New York, had not spared +the outer office of the Fillmore Nicholas Theatrical Enterprises Ltd. in +the months of her absence. She was greeted on her arrival by an entirely +new and original stripling in the place of the one with whom at her last +visit she had established such cordial relations. Like his predecessor +he was generously pimpled, but there the resemblance stopped. He was a +grim boy, and his manner was stern and suspicious. He peered narrowly at +Sally for a moment as if he had caught her in the act of purloining the +office blotting-paper, then, with no little acerbity, desired her to +state her business. + +"I want Mr. Kemp," said Sally. + +The office-boy scratched his cheek dourly with a ruler. No one would +have guessed, so austere was his aspect, that a moment before her +entrance he had been trying to balance it on his chin, juggling the +while with a pair of paper-weights. For, impervious as he seemed to +human weaknesses, it was this lad's ambition one day to go into +vaudeville. + +"What name?" he said, coldly. + +"Nicholas," said Sally. "I am Mr. Nicholas' sister." + +On a previous occasion when she had made this announcement, disastrous +results had ensued; but to-day it went well. It seemed to hit the +office-boy like a bullet. He started convulsively, opened his mouth, +and dropped the ruler. In the interval of stooping and recovering it he +was able to pull himself together. He had not been curious about Sally's +name. What he had wished was to have the name of the person for whom she +was asking repeated. He now perceived that he had had a bit of luck. A +wearying period of disappointment in the matter of keeping the +paper-weights circulating while balancing the ruler, had left him +peevish, and it had been his intention to work off his ill-humour on the +young visitor. The discovery that it was the boss's sister who was +taking up his time, suggested the advisability of a radical change of +tactics. He had stooped with a frown: he returned to the perpendicular +with a smile that was positively winning. It was like the sun suddenly +bursting through a London fog. + +"Will you take a seat, lady?" he said, with polished courtesy even +unbending so far as to reach out and dust one with the sleeve of his +coat. He added that the morning was a fine one. + +"Thank you," said Sally. "Will you tell him I'm here." + +"Mr. Nicholas is out, miss," said the office-boy, with gentlemanly +regret. "He's back in New York, but he's gone out." + +"I don't want Mr. Nicholas. I want Mr. Kemp." + +"Mr. Kemp?" + +"Yes, Mr. Kemp." + +Sorrow at his inability to oblige shone from every hill-top on the boy's +face. + +"Don't know of anyone of that name around here," he said, +apologetically. + +"But surely..." Sally broke off suddenly. A grim foreboding had come to +her. "How long have you been here?" she asked. + +"All day, ma'am," said the office-boy, with the manner of a Casablanca. + +"I mean, how long have you been employed here?" + +"Just over a month, miss." + +"Hasn't Mr. Kemp been in the office all that time?" + +"Name's new to me, lady. Does he look like anything? I meanter say, +what's he look like?" + +"He has very red hair." + +"Never seen him in here," said the office-boy. The truth shone coldly +on Sally. She blamed herself for ever having gone away, and told herself +that she might have known what would happen. Left to his own resources, +the unhappy Ginger had once more made a hash of it. And this hash must +have been a more notable and outstanding hash than any of his previous +efforts, for, surely, Fillmore would not lightly have dismissed one who +had come to him under her special protection. + +"Where is Mr. Nicholas?" she asked. It seemed to her that Fillmore was +the only possible source of information. "Did you say he was out?" + +"Really out, miss," said the office-boy, with engaging candour. "He +went off to White Plains in his automobile half-an-hour ago." + +"White Plains? What for?" + +The pimpled stripling had now given himself up wholeheartedly to social +chit-chat. Usually he liked his time to himself and resented the +intrusion of the outer world, for he who had chosen jugglery for his +walk in life must neglect no opportunity of practising: but so +favourable was the impression which Sally had made on his plastic mind +that he was delighted to converse with her as long as she wished. + +"I guess what's happened is, he's gone up to take a look at Bugs +Butler," he said. + +"Whose butler?" said Sally mystified. + +The office-boy smiled a tolerant smile. Though an admirer of the sex, +he was aware that women were seldom hep to the really important things +in life. He did not blame them. That was the way they were constructed, +and one simply had to accept it. + +"Bugs Butler is training up at White Plains, miss." + +"Who is Bugs Butler?" + +Something of his former bleakness of aspect returned to the office-boy. +Sally's question had opened up a subject on which he felt deeply. + +"Ah!" he replied, losing his air of respectful deference as he +approached the topic. "Who is he! That's what they're all saying, all +the wise guys. Who has Bugs Butler ever licked?" + +"I don't know," said Sally, for he had fixed her with a penetrating gaze +and seemed to be pausing for a reply. + +"Nor nobody else," said the stripling vehemently. "A lot of stiffs out +on the coast, that's all. Ginks nobody has ever heard of, except Cyclone +Mullins, and it took that false alarm fifteen rounds to get a referee's +decision over him. The boss would go and give him a chance against the +champ, but I could have told him that the legitimate contender was K-leg +Binns. K-leg put Cyclone Mullins out in the fifth. Well," said the +office-boy in the overwrought tone of one chafing at human folly, "if +anybody thinks Bugs Butler can last six rounds with Lew Lucas, I've two +bucks right here in my vest pocket that says it ain't so." + +Sally began to see daylight. + +"Oh, Bugs--Mr. Butler is one of the boxers in this fight that my brother +is interested in?" + +"That's right. He's going up against the lightweight champ. Lew Lucas +is the lightweight champ. He's a bird!" + +"Yes?" said Sally. This youth had a way of looking at her with his head +cocked on one side as though he expected her to say something. + +"Yes, sir!" said the stripling with emphasis. "Lew Lucas is a hot +sketch. He used to live on the next street to me," he added as clinching +evidence of his hero's prowess. "I've seen his old mother as close as I +am to you. Say, I seen her a hundred times. Is any stiff of a Bugs +Butler going to lick a fellow like that?" + +"It doesn't seem likely." + +"You spoke it!" said the lad crisply, striking unsuccessfully at a fly +which had settled on the blotting-paper. + +There was a pause. Sally started to rise. + +"And there's another thing," said the office-boy, loath to close the +subject. "Can Bugs Butler make a hundred and thirty-five ringside +without being weak?" + +"It sounds awfully difficult." + +"They say he's clever." The expert laughed satirically. "Well, what's +that going to get him? The poor fish can't punch a hole in a +nut-sundae." + +"You don't seem to like Mr. Butler." + +"Oh, I've nothing against him," said the office-boy magnanimously. +"I'm only saying he's no licence to be mixing it with Lew Lucas." + +Sally got up. Absorbing as this chat on current form was, more +important matters claimed her attention. + +"How shall I find my brother when I get to White Plains?" she asked. + +"Oh, anybody'll show you the way to the training-camp. If you hurry, +there's a train you can make now." + +"Thank you very much." + +"You're welcome." + +He opened the door for her with an old-world politeness which disuse had +rendered a little rusty: then, with an air of getting back to business +after a pleasant but frivolous interlude, he took up the paper-weights +once more and placed the ruler with nice care on his upturned chin. + + + +2 + + + +Fillmore heaved a sigh of relief and began to sidle from the room. It +was a large room, half barn, half gymnasium. Athletic appliances of +various kinds hung on the walls and in the middle there was a wide +roped-off space, around which a small crowd had distributed itself with +an air of expectancy. This is a commercial age, and the days when a +prominent pugilist's training activities used to be hidden from the +public gaze are over. To-day, if the public can lay its hands on fifty +cents, it may come and gaze its fill. This afternoon, plutocrats to the +number of about forty had assembled, though not all of these, to the +regret of Mr. Lester Burrowes, the manager of the eminent Bugs Butler, +had parted with solid coin. Many of those present were newspaper +representatives and on the free list--writers who would polish up Mr. +Butler's somewhat crude prognostications as to what he proposed to do to +Mr. Lew Lucas, and would report him as saying, "I am in really superb +condition and feel little apprehension of the issue," and artists who +would depict him in a state of semi-nudity with feet several sizes too +large for any man. + +The reason for Fillmore's relief was that Mr. Burrowes, who was a great +talker and had buttonholed him a quarter of an hour ago, had at last had +his attention distracted elsewhere, and had gone off to investigate +some matter that called for his personal handling, leaving Fillmore free +to slide away to the hotel and get a bite to eat, which he sorely +needed. The zeal which had brought him to the training-camp to inspect +the final day of Mr. Butler's preparation--for the fight was to take +place on the morrow--had been so great that he had omitted to lunch +before leaving New York. + +So Fillmore made thankfully for the door. And it was at the door that +he encountered Sally. He was looking over his shoulder at the moment, +and was not aware of her presence till she spoke. + +"Hallo, Fillmore!" + +Sally had spoken softly, but a dynamite explosion could not have +shattered her brother's composure with more completeness. In the leaping +twist which brought him facing her, he rose a clear three inches from +the floor. He had a confused sensation, as though his nervous system had +been stirred up with a pole. He struggled for breath and moistened his +lips with the tip of his tongue, staring at her continuously during the +process. + +Great men, in their moments of weakness, are to be pitied rather than +scorned. If ever a man had an excuse for leaping like a young ram, +Fillmore had it. He had left Sally not much more than a week ago in +England, in Shropshire, at Monk's Crofton. She had said nothing of any +intention on her part of leaving the country, the county, or the house. +Yet here she was, in Bugs Butler's training-camp at White Plains, in the +State of New York, speaking softly in his ear without even going through +the preliminary of tapping him on the shoulder to advertise her +presence. No wonder that Fillmore was startled. And no wonder that, as +he adjusted his faculties to the situation, there crept upon him a chill +apprehension. + +For Fillmore had not been blind to the significance of that invitation +to Monk's Crofton. Nowadays your wooer does not formally approach a +girl's nearest relative and ask permission to pay his addresses; but, +when he invites her and that nearest relative to his country home and +collects all the rest of the family to meet her, the thing may be said +to have advanced beyond the realms of mere speculation. Shrewdly +Fillmore had deduced that Bruce Carmyle was in love with Sally, and +mentally he had joined their hands and given them a brother's blessing. +And now it was only too plain that disaster must have occurred. If the +invitation could mean only one thing, so also could Sally's presence at +White Plains mean only one thing. + +"Sally!" A croaking whisper was the best he could achieve. "What... +what... ?" + +"Did I startle you? I'm sorry." + +"What are you doing here? Why aren't you at Monk's Crofton?" + +Sally glanced past him at the ring and the crowd around it. + +"I decided I wanted to get back to America. Circumstances arose which +made it pleasanter to leave Monk's Crofton." + +"Do you mean to say... ?" + +"Yes. Don't let's talk about it." + +"Do you mean to say," persisted Fillmore, "that Carmyle proposed to you +and you turned him down?" + +Sally flushed. + +"I don't think it's particularly nice to talk about that sort of thing, +but--yes." + +A feeling of desolation overcame Fillmore. That conviction, which +saddens us at all times, of the wilful bone-headedness of our fellows +swept coldly upon him. Everything had been so perfect, the whole +arrangement so ideal, that it had never occurred to him as a possibility +that Sally might take it into her head to spoil it by declining to play +the part allotted to her. The match was so obviously the best thing that +could happen. It was not merely the suitor's impressive wealth that made +him hold this opinion, though it would be idle to deny that the prospect +of having a brother-in-lawful claim on the Carmyle bank-balance had cast +a rosy glamour over the future as he had envisaged it. He honestly liked +and respected the man. He appreciated his quiet and aristocratic +reserve. A well-bred fellow, sensible withal, just the sort of husband a +girl like Sally needed. And now she had ruined everything. With the +capricious perversity which so characterizes her otherwise delightful +sex, she had spilled the beans. + +"But why?" + +"Oh, Fill!" Sally had expected that realization of the facts would +produce these symptoms in him, but now that they had presented +themselves she was finding them rasping to the nerves. "I should have +thought the reason was obvious." + +"You mean you don't like him?" + +"I don't know whether I do or not. I certainly don't like him enough to +marry him." + +"He's a darned good fellow." + +"Is he? You say so. I don't know." + +The imperious desire for bodily sustenance began to compete +successfully for Fillmore's notice with his spiritual anguish. + +"Let's go to the hotel and talk it over. We'll go to the hotel and I'll +give you something to eat." + +"I don't want anything to eat, thanks." + +"You don't want anything to eat?" said Fillmore incredulously. He +supposed in a vague sort of way that there were eccentric people of this +sort, but it was hard to realize that he had met one of them. "I'm +starving." + +"Well, run along then." + +"Yes, but I want to talk..." + +He was not the only person who wanted to talk. At the moment a small +man of sporting exterior hurried up. He wore what his tailor's +advertisements would have called a "nobbly" suit of checked tweed +and--in defiance of popular prejudice--a brown bowler hat. Mr. Lester +Burrowes, having dealt with the business which had interrupted their +conversation a few minutes before, was anxious to resume his remarks on +the subject of the supreme excellence in every respect of his young +charge. + +"Say, Mr. Nicholas, you ain't going'? Bugs is just getting ready to +spar." + +He glanced inquiringly at Sally. + +"My sister--Mr. Burrowes," said Fillmore faintly. "Mr. Burrowes is Bugs +Butler's manager." + +"How do you do?" said Sally. + +"Pleased to meecher," said Mr. Burrowes. "Say..." + +"I was just going to the hotel to get something to eat," said Fillmore. + +Mr. Burrowes clutched at his coat-button with a swoop, and held him with +a glittering eye. + +"Yes, but, say, before-you-go-lemme-tell-ya-somef'n. You've never seen +this boy of mine, not when he was feeling right. Believe me, he's there! +He's a wizard. He's a Hindoo! Say, he's been practising up a left shift +that..." + +Fillmore's eye met Sally's wanly, and she pitied him. Presently she +would require him to explain to her how he had dared to dismiss Ginger +from his employment--and make that explanation a good one: but in the +meantime she remembered that he was her brother and was suffering. + +"He's the cleverest lightweight," proceeded Mr. Burrowes fervently, +"since Joe Gans. I'm telling you and I know! He..." + +"Can he make a hundred and thirty-five ringside without being weak?" +asked Sally. + +The effect of this simple question on Mr. Burrowes was stupendous. He +dropped away from Fillmore's coat-button like an exhausted bivalve, and +his small mouth opened feebly. It was as if a child had suddenly +propounded to an eminent mathematician some abstruse problem in the +higher algebra. Females who took an interest in boxing had come into Mr. +Burrowes' life before---in his younger days, when he was a famous +featherweight, the first of his three wives had been accustomed to sit +at the ringside during his contests and urge him in language of the +severest technicality to knock opponents' blocks off--but somehow he had +not supposed from her appearance and manner that Sally was one of the +elect. He gaped at her, and the relieved Fillmore sidled off like a bird +hopping from the compelling gaze of a snake. He was not quite sure that +he was acting correctly in allowing his sister to roam at large among +the somewhat Bohemian surroundings of a training-camp, but the instinct +of self-preservation turned the scale. He had breakfasted early, and if +he did not eat right speedily it seemed to him that dissolution would +set in. + +"Whazzat?" said Mr. Burrowes feebly. + +"It took him fifteen rounds to get a referee's decision over Cyclone +Mullins," said Sally severely, "and K-leg Binns..." + +Mr. Burrowes rallies. + +"You ain't got it right" he protested. "Say, you mustn't believe what +you see in the papers. The referee was dead against us, and Cyclone was +down once for all of half a minute and they wouldn't count him out. Gee! +You got to kill a guy in some towns before they'll give you a decision. +At that, they couldn't do nothing so raw as make it anything but a win +for my boy, after him leading by a mile all the way. Have you ever seen +Bugs, ma'am?" + +Sally had to admit that she had not had that privilege. Mr. Burrowes +with growing excitement felt in his breast-pocket and produced a +picture-postcard, which he thrust into her hand. + +"That's Bugs," he said. "Take a slant at that and then tell me if he +don't look the goods." + +The photograph represented a young man in the irreducible minimum of +clothing who crouched painfully, as though stricken with one of the +acuter forms of gastritis. + +"I'll call him over and have him sign it for you," said Mr. Burrowes, +before Sally had had time to grasp the fact that this work of art was a +gift and no mere loan. "Here, Bugs--wantcher." + +A youth enveloped in a bath-robe, who had been talking to a group of +admirers near the ring, turned, started languidly towards them, then, +seeing Sally, quickened his pace. He was an admirer of the sex. + +Mr. Burrowes did the honours. + +"Bugs, this is Miss Nicholas, come to see you work out. I have been +telling her she's going to have a treat." And to Sally. "Shake hands +with Bugs Butler, ma'am, the coming lightweight champion of the world." + +Mr. Butler's photograph, Sally considered, had flattered him. He was, +in the flesh, a singularly repellent young man. There was a mean and +cruel curve to his lips and a cold arrogance in his eye; a something +dangerous and sinister in the atmosphere he radiated. Moreover, she did +not like the way he smirked at her. + +However, she exerted herself to be amiable. + +"I hope you are going to win, Mr. Butler," she said. + +The smile which she forced as she spoke the words removed the coming +champion's doubts, though they had never been serious. He was convinced +now that he had made a hit. He always did, he reflected, with the girls. +It was something about him. His chest swelled complacently beneath the +bath-robe. + +"You betcher," he asserted briefly. + +Mr. Burrows looked at his watch. + +"Time you were starting, Bugs." + +The coming champion removed his gaze from Sally's face, into which he +had been peering in a conquering manner, and cast a disparaging glance +at the audience. It was far from being as large as he could have wished, +and at least a third of it was composed of non-payers from the +newspapers. + +"All right," he said, bored. + +His languor left him, as his gaze fell on Sally again, and his spirits +revived somewhat. After all, small though the numbers of spectators +might be, bright eyes would watch and admire him. + +"I'll go a couple of rounds with Reddy for a starter," he said. "Seen +him anywheres? He's never around when he's wanted." + +"I'll fetch him," said Mr. Burrowes. "He's back there somewheres." + +"I'm going to show that guy up this afternoon," said Mr. Butler coldly. +"He's been getting too fresh." + +The manager bustled off, and Bugs Butler, with a final smirk, left Sally +and dived under the ropes. There was a stir of interest in the audience, +though the newspaper men, blasé through familiarity, exhibited no +emotion. Presently Mr. Burrowes reappeared, shepherding a young man +whose face was hidden by the sweater which he was pulling over his head. +He was a sturdily built young man. The sweater, moving from his body, +revealed a good pair of shoulders. + +A last tug, and the sweater was off. Red hair flashed into view, +tousled and disordered: and, as she saw it, Sally uttered an involuntary +gasp of astonishment which caused many eyes to turn towards her. And the +red-headed young man, who had been stooping to pick up his gloves, +straightened himself with a jerk and stood staring at her blankly and +incredulously, his face slowly crimsoning. + + + +3 + + + +It was the energetic Mr. Burrowes who broke the spell. + +"Come on, come on," he said impatiently. "Li'l speed there, Reddy." + +Ginger Kemp started like a sleep-walker awakened; then recovering +himself, slowly began to pull on the gloves. Embarrassment was stamped +on his agreeable features. His face matched his hair. + +Sally plucked at the little manager's elbow. He turned irritably, but +beamed in a distrait sort of manner when he perceived the source of the +interruption. + +"Who--him?" he said in answer to Sally's whispered question. "He's just +one of Bugs' sparring-partners." + +"But..." + +Mr. Burrowes, fussy now that the time had come for action, interrupted +her. + +"You'll excuse me, miss, but I have to hold the watch. We mustn't waste +any time." + +Sally drew back. She felt like an infidel who intrudes upon the +celebration of strange rites. This was Man's hour, and women must keep +in the background. She had the sensation of being very small and yet +very much in the way, like a puppy who has wandered into a church. The +novelty and solemnity of the scene awed her. + +She looked at Ginger, who with averted gaze was fiddling with his +clothes in the opposite corner of the ring. He was as removed from +communication as if he had been in another world. She continued to +stare, wide-eyed, and Ginger, shuffling his feet self-consciously, +plucked at his gloves. + +Mr. Butler, meanwhile, having doffed his bath-robe, stretched himself, +and with leisurely nonchalance put on a second pair of gloves, was +filling in the time with a little shadow boxing. He moved rhythmically +to and fro, now ducking his head, now striking out with his muffled +hands, and a sickening realization of the man's animal power swept over +Sally and turned her cold. Swathed in his bath-robe, Bugs Butler had +conveyed an atmosphere of dangerousness: in the boxing-tights which +showed up every rippling muscle, he was horrible and sinister, a machine +built for destruction, a human panther. + +So he appeared to Sally, but a stout and bulbous eyed man standing at +her side was not equally impressed. Obviously one of the Wise Guys of +whom her friend the sporting office-boy had spoken, he was frankly +dissatisfied with the exhibition. + +"Shadow-boxing," he observed in a cavilling spirit to his companion. +"Yes, he can do that all right, just like I can fox-trot if I ain't got +a partner to get in the way. But one good wallop, and then watch him." + +His friend, also plainly a guy of established wisdom, assented with a +curt nod. + +"Ah!" he agreed. + +"Lew Lucas," said the first wise guy, "is just as shifty, and he can +punch." + +"Ah!" said the second wise guy. + +"Just because he beats up a few poor mutts of sparring-partners," said +the first wise guy disparagingly, "he thinks he's someone." + +"Ah!" said the second wise guy. + +As far as Sally could interpret these remarks, the full meaning of which +was shrouded from her, they seemed to be reassuring. For a comforting +moment she ceased to regard Ginger as a martyr waiting to be devoured by +a lion. Mr. Butler, she gathered, was not so formidable as he appeared. +But her relief was not to be long-lived. + +"Of course he'll eat this red-headed gink," went on the first wise guy. +"That's the thing he does best, killing his sparring-partners. But Lew +Lucas..." + +Sally was not interested in Lew Lucas. That numbing fear had come back +to her. Even these cognoscenti, little as they esteemed Mr. Butler, had +plainly no doubts as to what he would do to Ginger. She tried to tear +herself away, but something stronger than her own will kept her there +standing where she was, holding on to the rope and staring forlornly +into the ring. + +"Ready, Bugs?" asked Mr. Burrowes. + +The coming champion nodded carelessly. + +"Go to it," said Mr. Burrowes. + +Ginger ceased to pluck at his gloves and advanced into the ring. + + + +4 + + + +Of all the learned professions, pugilism is the one in which the trained +expert is most sharply divided from the mere dabbler. In other fields +the amateur may occasionally hope to compete successfully with the man +who has made a business of what is to him but a sport, but at boxing +never: and the whole demeanour of Bugs Butler showed that he had laid +this truth to heart. It would be too little to say that his bearing was +confident: he comported himself with the care-free jauntiness of an +infant about to demolish a Noah's Ark with a tack-hammer. Cyclone +Mullinses might withstand him for fifteen rounds where they yielded to a +K-leg Binns in the fifth, but, when it came to beating up a +sparring-partner and an amateur at that, Bugs Butler knew his +potentialities. He was there forty ways and he did not attempt to +conceal it. Crouching as was his wont, he uncoiled himself like a +striking rattlesnake and flicked Ginger lightly over his guard. Then he +returned to his crouch and circled sinuously about the ring with the +amiable intention of showing the crowd, payers and deadheads alike, what +real footwork was. If there was one thing on which Bugs Butler prided +himself, it was footwork. + +The adverb "lightly" is a relative term, and the blow which had just +planted a dull patch on Ginger's cheekbone affected those present in +different degrees. Ginger himself appeared stolidly callous. Sally +shuddered to the core of her being and had to hold more tightly to the +rope to support herself. The two wise guys mocked openly. To the wise +guys, expert connoisseurs of swat, the thing had appeared richly +farcical. They seemed to consider the blow, administered to a third +party and not to themselves, hardly worth calling a blow at all. Two +more, landing as quickly and neatly as the first, left them equally +cold. + +"Call that punching?" said the first wise guy. + +"Ah!" said the second wise guy. + +But Mr. Butler, if he heard this criticism--and it is probable that he +did--for the wise ones had been restrained by no delicacy of feeling +from raising their voices, was in no way discommoded by it. Bugs Butler +knew what he was about. Bright eyes were watching him, and he meant to +give them a treat. The girls like smooth work. Any roughneck could sail +into a guy and knock the daylights out of him, but how few could be +clever and flashy and scientific? Few, few, indeed, thought Mr. Butler +as he slid in and led once more. + +Something solid smote Mr. Butler's nose, rocking him on to his heels and +inducing an unpleasant smarting sensation about his eyes. He backed away +and regarded Ginger with astonishment, almost with pain. Until this +moment he had scarcely considered him as an active participant in the +scene at all, and he felt strongly that this sort of thing was bad form. +It was not being done by sparring-partners. + +A juster man might have reflected that he himself was to blame. He had +undeniably been careless. In the very act of leading he had allowed his +eyes to flicker sideways to see how Sally was taking this exhibition of +science, and he had paid the penalty. Nevertheless, he was piqued. He +shimmered about the ring, thinking it over. And the more he thought it +over, the less did he approve of his young assistant's conduct. Hard +thoughts towards Ginger began to float in his mind. + +Ginger, too, was thinking hard thoughts. He had not had an easy time +since he had come to the training camp, but never till to-day had he +experienced any resentment towards his employer. Until this afternoon +Bugs Butler had pounded him honestly and without malice, and he had gone +through it, as the other sparring-partners did, phlegmatically, taking +it as part of the day's work. But this afternoon there had been a +difference. Those careless flicks had been an insult, a deliberate +offence. The man was trying to make a fool of him, playing to the +gallery: and the thought of who was in that gallery inflamed Ginger past +thought of consequences. No one, not even Mr. Butler, was more keenly +alive than he to the fact that in a serious conflict with a man who +to-morrow night might be light-weight champion of the world he stood no +chance whatever: but he did not intend to be made an exhibition of in +front of Sally without doing something to hold his end up. He proposed +to go down with his flag flying, and in pursuance of this object he dug +Mr. Butler heavily in the lower ribs with his right, causing that expert +to clinch and the two wise guys to utter sharp barking sounds expressive +of derision. + +"Say, what the hell d'ya think you're getting at?" demanded the +aggrieved pugilist in a heated whisper in Ginger's ear as they fell into +the embrace. "What's the idea, you jelly bean?" + +Ginger maintained a pink silence. His jaw was set, and the temper which +Nature had bestowed upon him to go with his hair had reached white heat. +He dodged a vicious right which whizzed up at his chin out of the +breaking clinch, and rushed. A left hook shook him, but was too high to +do more. There was rough work in the far corner, and suddenly with +startling abruptness Bugs Butler, bothered by the ropes at his back and +trying to side-step, ran into a swing and fell. + +"Time!" shouted the scandalized Mr. Burrowes, utterly aghast at this +frightful misadventure. In the whole course of his professional +experience he could recall no such devastating occurrence. + +The audience was no less startled. There was audible gasping. The +newspaper men looked at each other with a wild surmise and conjured up +pleasant pictures of their sporting editors receiving this sensational +item of news later on over the telephone. The two wise guys, continuing +to pursue Mr. Butler with their dislike, emitted loud and raucous +laughs, and one of them, forming his hands into a megaphone, urged the +fallen warrior to go away and get a rep. As for Sally, she was conscious +of a sudden, fierce, cave-womanly rush of happiness which swept away +completely the sickening qualms of the last few minutes. Her teeth were +clenched and her eyes blazed with joyous excitement. She looked at +Ginger yearningly, longing to forget a gentle upbringing and shout +congratulation to him. She was proud of him. And mingled with the pride +was a curious feeling that was almost fear. This was not the mild and +amiable young man whom she was wont to mother through the difficulties +of a world in which he was unfitted to struggle for himself. This was a +new Ginger, a stranger to her. + +On the rare occasions on which he had been knocked down in the past, it +had been Bugs Butler's canny practice to pause for a while and rest +before rising and continuing the argument, but now he was up almost +before he had touched the boards, and the satire of the second wise guy, +who had begun to saw the air with his hand and count loudly, lost its +point. It was only too plain that Mr. Butler's motto was that a man may +be down, but he is never out. And, indeed, the knock-down had been +largely a stumble. Bugs Butler's educated feet, which had carried him +unscathed through so many contests, had for this single occasion managed +to get themselves crossed just as Ginger's blow landed, and it was to +his lack of balance rather than the force of the swing that his downfall +had been due. + +"Time!" he snarled, casting a malevolent side-glance at his manager. +"Like hell it's time!" + +And in a whirlwind of flying gloves he flung himself upon Ginger, +driving him across the ring, while Mr. Burrowes, watch in hand, stared +with dropping jaw. If Ginger had seemed a new Ginger to Sally, still +more did this seem a new Bugs Butler to Mr. Burrowes, and the manager +groaned in spirit. Coolness, skill and science--these had been the +qualities in his protégé which had always so endeared him to Mr. Lester +Burrowes and had so enriched their respective bank accounts: and now, on +the eve of the most important fight in his life, before an audience of +newspaper men, he had thrown them all aside and was making an exhibition +of himself with a common sparring-partner. + +That was the bitter blow to Mr. Burrowes. Had this lapse into the +unscientific primitive happened in a regular fight, he might have +mourned and poured reproof into Bug's ear when he got him back in his +corner at the end of the round; but he would not have experienced this +feeling of helpless horror--the sort of horror an elder of the church +might feel if he saw his favourite bishop yielding in public to the +fascination of jazz. It was the fact that Bugs Butler was lowering +himself to extend his powers against a sparring-partner that shocked Mr. +Burrowes. There is an etiquette in these things. A champion may batter +his sparring-partners into insensibility if he pleases, but he must do +it with nonchalance. He must not appear to be really trying. + +And nothing could be more manifest than that Bugs Butler was trying. +His whole fighting soul was in his efforts to corner Ginger and destroy +him. The battle was raging across the ring and down the ring, and up the +ring and back again; yet always Ginger, like a storm-driven ship, +contrived somehow to weather the tempest. Out of the flurry of swinging +arms he emerged time after time bruised, bleeding, but fighting hard. + +For Bugs Butler's fury was defeating its object. Had he remained his +cool and scientific self, he could have demolished Ginger and cut +through his defence in a matter of seconds. But he had lapsed back into +the methods of his unskilled novitiate. He swung and missed, swung and +missed again, struck but found no vital spot. And now there was blood on +his face, too. In some wild mêlée the sacred fount had been tapped, and +his teeth gleamed through a crimson mist. + +The Wise Guys were beyond speech. They were leaning against one +another, punching each other feebly in the back. One was crying. + +And then suddenly the end came, as swiftly and unexpectedly as the +thing had begun. His wild swings had tired Bugs Butler, and with fatigue +prudence returned to him. His feet began once more their subtle weaving +in and out. Twice his left hand flickered home. A quick feint, a short, +jolting stab, and Ginger's guard was down and he was swaying in the +middle of the ring, his hands hanging and his knees a-quiver. + +Bugs Butler measured his distance, and Sally shut her eyes. + + + + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + + + +MR. ABRAHAMS RE-ENGAGES AN OLD EMPLOYEE + + + +1 + + + +The only real happiness, we are told, is to be obtained by bringing +happiness to others. Bugs Butler's mood, accordingly, when some thirty +hours after the painful episode recorded in the last chapter he awoke +from a state of coma in the ring at Jersey City to discover that Mr. Lew +Lucas had knocked him out in the middle of the third round, should have +been one of quiet contentment. His inability to block a short left-hook +followed by a right to the point of the jaw had ameliorated quite a +number of existences. + +Mr. Lew Lucas, for one, was noticeably pleased. So were Mr. Lucas's +seconds, one of whom went so far as to kiss him. And most of the crowd, +who had betted heavily on the champion, were delighted. Yet Bugs Butler +did not rejoice. It is not too much to say that his peevish bearing +struck a jarring note in the general gaiety. A heavy frown disfigured +his face as he slouched from the ring. + +But the happiness which he had spread went on spreading. The two Wise +Guys, who had been unable to attend the fight in person, received the +result on the ticker and exuberantly proclaimed themselves the richer by +five hundred dollars. The pimpled office-boy at the Fillmore Nicholas +Theatrical Enterprises Ltd. caused remark in the Subway by whooping +gleefully when he read the news in his morning paper, for he, too, had +been rendered wealthier by the brittleness of Mr. Butler's chin. And it +was with fierce satisfaction that Sally, breakfasting in her little +apartment, informed herself through the sporting page of the details of +the contender's downfall. She was not a girl who disliked many people, +but she had acquired a lively distaste for Bugs Butler. + +Lew Lucas seemed a man after her own heart. If he had been a personal +friend of Ginger's he could not, considering the brief time at his +disposal, have avenged him with more thoroughness. In round one he had +done all sorts of diverting things to Mr. Butler's left eye: in round +two he had continued the good work on that gentleman's body; and in +round three he had knocked him out. Could anyone have done more? Sally +thought not, and she drank Lew Lucas's health in a cup of coffee and +hoped his old mother was proud of him. + +The telephone bell rang at her elbow. She unhooked the receiver. + +"Hullo?" + +"Oh, hullo," said a voice. + +"Ginger!" cried Sally delightedly. + +"I say, I'm awfully glad you're back. I only got your letter this +morning. Found it at the boarding-house. I happened to look in there +and..." + +"Ginger," interrupted Sally, "your voice is music, but I want to see +you. Where are you?" + +"I'm at a chemist's shop across the street. I was wondering if..." + +"Come here at once!" + +"I say, may I? I was just going to ask." + +"You miserable creature, why haven't you been round to see me before?" + +"Well, as a matter of fact, I haven't been going about much for the last +day. You see..." + +"I know. Of course." Quick sympathy came into Sally's voice. She gave +a sidelong glance of approval and gratitude at the large picture of Lew +Lucas which beamed up at her from the morning paper. "You poor thing! +How are you?" + +"Oh, all right, thanks." + +"Well, hurry." + +There was a slight pause at the other end of the wire. + +"I say." + +"Well?" + +"I'm not much to look at, you know." + +"You never were. Stop talking and hurry over." + +"I mean to say..." + +Sally hung up the receiver firmly. She waited eagerly for some minutes, +and then footsteps came along the passage. They stopped at her door and +the bell rang. Sally ran to the door, flung it open, and recoiled in +consternation. + +"Oh, Ginger!" + +He had stated the facts accurately when he had said that he was not much +to look at. He gazed at her devotedly out of an unblemished right eye, +but the other was hidden altogether by a puffy swelling of dull purple. +A great bruise marred his left cheek-bone, and he spoke with some +difficulty through swollen lips. + +"It's all right, you know," he assured her. + +"It isn't. It's awful! Oh, you poor darling!" She clenched her teeth +viciously. "I wish he had killed him!" + +"Eh?" + +"I wish Lew Lucas or whatever his name is had murdered him. Brute!" + +"Oh, I don't know, you know." Ginger's sense of fairness compelled him +to defend his late employer against these harsh sentiments. "He isn't a +bad sort of chap, really. Bugs Butler, I mean." + +"Do you seriously mean to stand there and tell me you don't loathe the +creature?" + +"Oh, he's all right. See his point of view and all that. Can't blame +him, if you come to think of it, for getting the wind up a bit in the +circs. Bit thick, I mean to say, a sparring-partner going at him like +that. Naturally he didn't think it much of a wheeze. It was my fault +right along. Oughtn't to have done it, of course, but somehow, when he +started making an ass of me and I knew you were looking on... well, it +seemed a good idea to have a dash at doing something on my own. No right +to, of course. A sparring-partner isn't supposed..." + +"Sit down," said Sally. + +Ginger sat down. + +"Ginger," said Sally, "you're too good to live." + +"Oh, I say!" + +"I believe if someone sandbagged you and stole your watch and chain +you'd say there were faults on both sides or something. I'm just a cat, +and I say I wish your beast of a Bugs Butler had perished miserably. I'd +have gone and danced on his grave... But whatever made you go in for +that sort of thing?" + +"Well, it seemed the only job that was going at the moment. I've always +done a goodish bit of boxing and I was very fit and so on, and it looked +to me rather an opening. Gave me something to get along with. You get +paid quite fairly decently, you know, and it's rather a jolly life..." + +"Jolly? Being hammered about like that?" + +"Oh, you don't notice it much. I've always enjoyed scrapping rather. +And, you see, when your brother gave me the push..." + +Sally uttered an exclamation. + +"What an extraordinary thing it is--I went all the way out to White +Plains that afternoon to find Fillmore and tackle him about that and I +didn't say a word about it. And I haven't seen or been able to get hold +of him since." + +"No? Busy sort of cove, your brother." + +"Why did Fillmore let you go?" + +"Let me go? Oh, you mean... well, there was a sort of mix-up. A kind of +misunderstanding." + +"What happened?" + +"Oh, it was nothing. Just a..." + +"What happened?" + +Ginger's disfigured countenance betrayed embarrassment. He looked +awkwardly about the room. + +"It's not worth talking about." + +"It is worth talking about. I've a right to know. It was I who sent +you to Fillmore..." + +"Now that," said Ginger, "was jolly decent of you." + +"Don't interrupt! I sent you to Fillmore, and he had no business to let +you go without saying a word to me. What happened?" + +Ginger twiddled his fingers unhappily. + +"Well, it was rather unfortunate. You see, his wife--I don't know if +you know her?..." + +"Of course I know her." + +"Why, yes, you would, wouldn't you? Your brother's wife, I mean," said +Ginger acutely. "Though, as a matter of fact, you often find +sisters-in-law who won't have anything to do with one another. I know a +fellow..." + +"Ginger," said Sally, "it's no good your thinking you can get out of +telling me by rambling off on other subjects. I'm grim and resolute and +relentless, and I mean to get this story out of you if I have to use a +corkscrew. Fillmore's wife, you were saying..." + +Ginger came back reluctantly to the main theme. + +"Well, she came into the office one morning, and we started fooling +about..." + +"Fooling about?" + +"Well, kind of chivvying each other." + +"Chivvying?" + +"At least I was." + +"You were what?" + +"Sort of chasing her a bit, you know." + +Sally regarded this apostle of frivolity with amazement. + +"What do you mean?" + +Ginger's embarrassment increased. + +"The thing was, you see, she happened to trickle in rather quietly when +I happened to be looking at something, and I didn't know she was there +till she suddenly grabbed it..." + +"Grabbed what?" + +"The thing. The thing I happened to be looking at. She bagged it... +collared it... took it away from me, you know, and wouldn't give it back +and generally started to rot about a bit, so I rather began to chivvy +her to some extent, and I'd just caught her when your brother happened +to roll in. I suppose," said Ginger, putting two and two together, "he +had really come with her to the office and had happened to hang back for +a minute or two, to talk to somebody or something... well, of course, +he was considerably fed to see me apparently doing jiu-jitsu with his +wife. Enough to rattle any man, if you come to think of it," said +Ginger, ever fair-minded. "Well, he didn't say anything at the time, but +a bit later in the day he called me in and administered the push." + +Sally shook her head. + +"It sounds the craziest story to me. What was it that Mrs. Fillmore +took from you?" + +"Oh, just something." + +Sally rapped the table imperiously. + +"Ginger!" + +"Well, as a matter of fact," said her goaded visitor, "It was a +photograph." + +"Who of? Or, if you're particular, of whom?" + +"Well... you, to be absolutely accurate." + +"Me?" Sally stared. "But I've never given you a photograph of myself." + +Ginger's face was a study in scarlet and purple. + +"You didn't exactly give it to me," he mumbled. "When I say give, I +mean..." + +"Good gracious!" Sudden enlightenment came upon Sally. "That photograph +we were hunting for when I first came here! Had you stolen it all the +time?" + +"Why, yes, I did sort of pinch it..." + +"You fraud! You humbug! And you pretended to help me look for it." She +gazed at him almost with respect. "I never knew you were so deep and +snaky. I'm discovering all sorts of new things about you." + +There was a brief silence. Ginger, confession over, seemed a trifle +happier. + +"I hope you're not frightfully sick about it?" he said at length. "It +was lying about, you know, and I rather felt I must have it. Hadn't the +cheek to ask you for it, so..." + +"Don't apologize," said Sally cordially. "Great compliment. So I have +caused your downfall again, have I? I'm certainly your evil genius, +Ginger. I'm beginning to feel like a regular rag and a bone and a hank +of hair. First I egged you on to insult your family--oh, by the way, I +want to thank you about that. Now that I've met your Uncle Donald I can +see how public-spirited you were. I ruined your prospects there, and now +my fatal beauty--cabinet size--has led to your destruction once more. +It's certainly up to me to find you another job, I can see that." + +"No, really, I say, you mustn't bother. I shall be all right." + +"It's my duty. Now what is there that you really can do? Burglary, of +course, but it's not respectable. You've tried being a waiter and a +prize-fighter and a right-hand man, and none of those seems to be just +right. Can't you suggest anything?" + +Ginger shook his head. + +"I shall wangle something, I expect." ' + +"Yes, but what? It must be something good this time. I don't want to be +walking along Broadway and come on you suddenly as a street-cleaner. I +don't want to send for an express-man and find you popping up. My idea +would be to go to my bank to arrange an overdraft and be told the +president could give me two minutes and crawl in humbly and find you +prezzing away to beat the band in a big chair. Isn't there anything in +the world that you can do that's solid and substantial and will keep you +out of the poor-house in your old age? Think!" + +"Of course, if I had a bit of capital..." + +"Ah! The business man! And what," inquired Sally, "would you do, Mr. +Morgan, if you had a bit of capital?" + +"Run a dog-thingummy," said Ginger promptly. + +"What's a dog-thingummy?" + +"Why, a thingamajig. For dogs, you know." + +Sally nodded. + +"Oh, a thingamajig for dogs? Now I understand. You will put things so +obscurely at first. Ginger, you poor fish, what are you raving about? +What on earth is a thingamajig for dogs?" + +"I mean a sort of place like fellows have. Breeding dogs, you know, and +selling them and winning prizes and all that. There are lots of them +about." + +"Oh, a kennels?" + +"Yes, a kennels." + +"What a weird mind you have, Ginger. You couldn't say kennels at first, +could you? That wouldn't have made it difficult enough. I suppose, if +anyone asked you where you had your lunch, you would say, 'Oh, at a +thingamajig for mutton chops'... Ginger, my lad, there is something in +this. I believe for the first time in our acquaintance you have spoken +something very nearly resembling a mouthful. You're wonderful with dogs, +aren't you?" + +"I'm dashed keen on them, and I've studied them a bit. As a matter of +fact, though it seems rather like swanking, there isn't much about dogs +that I don't know." + +"Of course. I believe you're a sort of honorary dog yourself. I could +tell it by the way you stopped that fight at Roville. You plunged into a +howling mass of about a million hounds of all species and just whispered +in their ears and they stopped at once. Why, the more one examines this, +the better it looks. I do believe it's the one thing you couldn't help +making a success of. It's very paying, isn't it?" + +"Works out at about a hundred per cent on the original outlay, I've been +told." + +"A hundred per cent? That sounds too much like something of Fillmore's +for comfort. Let's say ninety-nine and be conservative. Ginger, you have +hit it. Say no more. You shall be the Dog King, the biggest +thingamajigger for dogs in the country. But how do you start?" + +"Well, as a matter of fact, while I was up at White Plains, I ran into a +cove who had a place of the sort and wanted to sell out. That was what +made me think of it." + +"You must start to-day. Or early to-morrow." + +"Yes," said Ginger doubtfully. "Of course, there's the catch, you +know." + +"What catch?" + +"The capital. You've got to have that. This fellow wouldn't sell out +under five thousand dollars." + +"I'll lend you five thousand dollars." + +"No!" said Ginger. + +Sally looked at him with exasperation. "Ginger, I'd like to slap you," +she said. It was maddening, this intrusion of sentiment into business +affairs. Why, simply because he was a man and she was a woman, should +she be restrained from investing money in a sound commercial +undertaking? If Columbus had taken up this bone-headed stand towards +Queen Isabella, America would never have been discovered. + +"I can't take five thousand dollars off you," said Ginger firmly. + +"Who's talking of taking it off me, as you call it?" stormed Sally. +"Can't you forget your burglarious career for a second? This isn't the +same thing as going about stealing defenceless girls' photographs. This +is business. I think you would make an enormous success of a dog-place, +and you admit you're good, so why make frivolous objections? Why +shouldn't I put money into a good thing? Don't you want me to get rich, +or what is it?" + +Ginger was becoming confused. Argument had never been his strong point. + +"But it's such a lot of money." + +"To you, perhaps. Not to me. I'm a plutocrat. Five thousand dollars! +What's five thousand dollars? I feed it to the birds." + +Ginger pondered woodenly for a while. His was a literal mind, and he +knew nothing of Sally's finances beyond the fact that when he had first +met her she had come into a legacy of some kind. Moreover, he had been +hugely impressed by Fillmore's magnificence. It seemed plain enough +that the Nicholases were a wealthy family. + +"I don't like it, you know," he said. + +"You don't have to like it," said Sally. "You just do it." + +A consoling thought flashed upon Ginger. + +"You'd have to let me pay you interest." + +"Let you? My lad, you'll have to pay me interest. What do you think +this is--a round game? It's a cold business deal." + +"Topping!" said Ginger relieved. "How about twenty-five per cent." + +"Don't be silly," said Sally quickly. "I want three." + +"No, that's all rot," protested Ginger. "I mean to say--three. I +don't," he went on, making a concession, "mind saying twenty." + +"If you insist, I'll make it five. Not more." + +"Well, ten, then?" + +"Five!" + +"Suppose," said Ginger insinuatingly, "I said seven?" + +"I never saw anyone like you for haggling," said Sally with disapproval. +"Listen! Six. And that's my last word." + +"Six?" + +"Six." + +Ginger did sums in his head. + +"But that would only work out at three hundred dollars a year. It isn't +enough." + +"What do you know about it? As if I hadn't been handling this sort of +deal in my life. Six! Do you agree?" + +"I suppose so." + +"Then that's settled. Is this man you talk about in New York?" + +"No, he's down on Long Island at a place on the south shore." + +"I mean, can you get him on the 'phone and clinch the thing?" + +"Oh, yes. I know his address, and I suppose his number's in the book." + +"Then go off at once and settle with him before somebody else snaps him +up. Don't waste a minute." + +Ginger paused at the door. + +"I say, you're absolutely sure about this?''' + +"Of course." + +"I mean to say..." + +"Get on," said Sally. + + + +2 + + + +The window of Sally's sitting-room looked out on to a street which, +while not one of the city's important arteries, was capable, +nevertheless, of affording a certain amount of entertainment to the +observer: and after Ginger had left, she carried the morning paper to +the window-sill and proceeded to divide her attention between a third +reading of the fight-report and a lazy survey of the outer world. It was +a beautiful day, and the outer world was looking its best. + +She had not been at her post for many minutes when a taxi-cab stopped at +the apartment-house, and she was surprised and interested to see her +brother Fillmore heave himself out of the interior. He paid the driver, +and the cab moved off, leaving him on the sidewalk casting a large +shadow in the sunshine. Sally was on the point of calling to him, when +his behaviour became so odd that astonishment checked her. + +From where she sat Fillmore had all the appearance of a man practising +the steps of a new dance, and sheer curiosity as to what he would do +next kept Sally watching in silence. First, he moved in a resolute sort +of way towards the front door; then, suddenly stopping, scuttled back. +This movement he repeated twice, after which he stood in deep thought +before making another dash for the door, which, like the others, came to +an abrupt end as though he had run into some invisible obstacle. And, +finally, wheeling sharply, he bustled off down the street and was lost +to view. + +Sally could make nothing of it. If Fillmore had taken the trouble to +come in a taxi-cab, obviously to call upon her, why had he abandoned the +idea at her very threshold? She was still speculating on this mystery +when the telephone-bell rang, and her brother's voice spoke huskily in +her ear. + +"Sally?" + +"Hullo, Fill. What are you going to call it?" + +"What am I... Call what?" + +"The dance you were doing outside here just now. It's your own +invention, isn't it?" + +"Did you see me?" said Fillmore, upset. + +"Of course I saw you. I was fascinated." + +"I--er--I was coming to have a talk with you. Sally..." + +Fillmore's voice trailed off. + +"Well, why didn't you?" + +There was a pause--on Fillmore's part, if the timbre of at his voice +correctly indicated his feelings, a pause of discomfort. Something was +plainly vexing Fillmore's great mind. + +"Sally," he said at last, and coughed hollowly into the receiver. + +"Yes." + +"I--that is to say, I have asked Gladys... Gladys will be coming to see +you very shortly. Will you be in?" + +"I'll stay in. How is Gladys? I'm longing to see her again." + +"She is very well. A trifle--a little upset." + +"Upset? What about?" + +"She will tell you when she arrives. I have just been 'phoning to her. +She is coming at once." There was another pause. "I'm afraid she has bad +news." + +"What news?" + +There was silence at the other end of the wire. + +"What news?" repeated Sally, a little sharply. She hated mysteries. + +But Fillmore had rung off. Sally hung up the receiver thoughtfully. +She was puzzled and anxious. However, there being nothing to be gained +by worrying, she carried the breakfast things into the kitchen and +tried to divert herself by washing up. Presently a ring at the door-bell +brought her out, to find her sister-in-law. + +Marriage, even though it had brought with it the lofty position of +partnership with the Hope of the American Stage, had effected no +noticeable alteration in the former Miss Winch. As Mrs. Fillmore she was +the same square, friendly creature. She hugged Sally in a muscular +manner and went on in the sitting-room. + +"Well, it's great seeing you again," she said. "I began to think you +were never coming back. What was the big idea, springing over to England +like that?" + +Sally had been expecting the question, and answered it with composure. + +"I wanted to help Mr. Faucitt." + +"Who's Mr. Faucitt?" + +"Hasn't Fillmore ever mentioned him? He was a dear old man at the +boarding-house, and his brother died and left him a dressmaking +establishment in London. He screamed to me to come and tell him what to +do about it. He has sold it now and is quite happy in the country." + +"Well, the trip's done you good," said Mrs. Fillmore. "You're prettier +than ever." + +There was a pause. Already, in these trivial opening exchanges, Sally +had sensed a suggestion of unwonted gravity in her companion. She missed +that careless whimsicality which had been the chief characteristic of +Miss Gladys Winch and seemed to have been cast off by Mrs. Fillmore +Nicholas. At their meeting, before she had spoken, Sally had not noticed +this, but now it was apparent that something was weighing on her +companion. Mrs. Fillmore's honest eyes were troubled. + +"What's the bad news?" asked Sally abruptly. She wanted to end the +suspense. "Fillmore was telling me over the 'phone that you had some bad +news for me." + +Mrs. Fillmore scratched at the carpet for a moment with the end of her +parasol without replying. When she spoke it was not in answer to the +question. + +"Sally, who's this man Carmyle over in England?" + +"Oh, did Fillmore tell you about him?" + +"He told me there was a rich fellow over in England who was crazy about +you and had asked you to marry him, and that you had turned him down." + +Sally's momentary annoyance faded. She could hardly, she felt, have +expected Fillmore to refrain from mentioning the matter to his wife. + +"Yes," she said. "That's true." + +"You couldn't write and say you've changed your mind?" + +Sally's annoyance returned. All her life she had been intensely +independent, resentful of interference with her private concerns. + +"I suppose I could if I had--but I haven't. Did Fillmore tell you to +try to talk me round?" + +"Oh, I'm not trying to talk you round," said Mrs. Fillmore quickly. +"Goodness knows, I'm the last person to try and jolly anyone into +marrying anybody if they didn't feel like it. I've seen too many +marriages go wrong to do that. Look at Elsa Doland." + +Sally's heart jumped as if an exposed nerve had been touched. + +"Elsa?" she stammered, and hated herself because her voice shook. +"Has--has her marriage gone wrong?" + +"Gone all to bits," said Mrs. Fillmore shortly. "You remember she +married Gerald Foster, the man who wrote 'The Primrose Way'?" + +Sally with an effort repressed an hysterical laugh. + +"Yes, I remember," she said. + +"Well, it's all gone bloo-ey. I'll tell you about that in a minute. +Coming back to this man in England, if you're in any doubt about it... I +mean, you can't always tell right away whether you're fond of a man or +not... When first I met Fillmore, I couldn't see him with a spy-glass, +and now he's just the whole shooting-match... But that's not what I +wanted to talk about. I was saying one doesn't always know one's own +mind at first, and if this fellow really is a good fellow... and +Fillmore tells me he's got all the money in the world..." + +Sally stopped her. + +"No, it's no good. I don't want to marry Mr. Carmyle." + +"That's that, then," said Mrs. Fillmore. "It's a pity, though." + +"Why are you taking it so much to heart?" said Sally with a nervous +laugh. + +"Well..." Mrs. Fillmore paused. Sally's anxiety was growing. It must, +she realized, be something very serious indeed that had happened if it +had the power to make her forthright sister-in-law disjointed in her +talk. "You see..." went on Mrs. Fillmore, and stopped again. "Gee! I'm +hating this!" she murmured. + +"What is it? I don't understand." + +"You'll find it's all too darned clear by the time I'm through," said +Mrs. Fillmore mournfully. "If I'm going to explain this thing, I guess +I'd best start at the beginning. You remember that revue of +Fillmore's--the one we both begged him not to put on. It flopped!" + +"Oh!" + +"Yes. It flopped on the road and died there. Never got to New York at +all. Ike Schumann wouldn't let Fillmore have a theatre. The book wanted +fixing and the numbers wanted fixing and the scenery wasn't right: and +while they were tinkering with all that there was trouble about the cast +and the Actors Equity closed the show. Best thing that could have +happened, really, and I was glad at the time, because going on with it +would only have meant wasting more money, and it had cost a fortune +already. After that Fillmore put on a play of Gerald Foster's and that +was a frost, too. It ran a week at the Booth. I hear the new piece he's +got in rehearsal now is no good either. It's called 'The Wild Rose,' or +something. But Fillmore's got nothing to do with that." + +"But..." Sally tried to speak, but Mrs. Fillmore went on. + +"Don't talk just yet, or I shall never get this thing straight. Well, +you know Fillmore, poor darling. Anyone else would have pulled in his +horns and gone slow for a spell, but he's one of those fellows whose +horse is always going to win the next race. The big killing is always +just round the corner with him. Funny how you can see what a chump a man +is and yet love him to death... I remember saying something like that to +you before... He thought he could get it all back by staging this fight +of his that came off in Jersey City last night. And if everything had +gone right he might have got afloat again. But it seems as if he can't +touch anything without it turning to mud. On the very day before the +fight was to come off, the poor mutt who was going against the champion +goes and lets a sparring-partner of his own knock him down and fool +around with him. With all the newspaper men there too! You probably saw +about it in the papers. It made a great story for them. Well, that +killed the whole thing. The public had never been any too sure that this +fellow Bugs Butler had a chance of putting up a scrap with the champion +that would be worth paying to see; and, when they read that he couldn't +even stop his sparring-partners slamming him all around the place they +simply decided to stay away. Poor old Fill! It was a finisher for him. +The house wasn't a quarter full, and after he'd paid these two +pluguglies their guarantees, which they insisted on having before they'd +so much as go into the ring, he was just about cleaned out. So there you +are!" + +Sally had listened with dismay to this catalogue of misfortunes. + +"Oh, poor Fill!" she cried. "How dreadful!" + +"Pretty tough." + +"But 'The Primrose Way' is a big success, isn't it?" said Sally, anxious +to discover something of brightness in the situation. + +"It was." Mrs. Fillmore flushed again. "This is the part I hate having +to tell you." + +"It was? Do you mean it isn't still? I thought Elsa had made such a +tremendous hit. I read about it when I was over in London. It was even +in one of the English papers." + +"Yes, she made a hit all right," said Mrs. Fillmore drily. "She made +such a hit that all the other managements in New York were after her +right away, and Fillmore had hardly sailed when she handed in her notice +and signed up with Goble and Cohn for a new piece they are starring her +in." + +"Ah, she couldn't!" cried Sally. + +"My dear, she did! She's out on the road with it now. I had to break +the news to poor old Fillmore at the dock when he landed. It was rather +a blow. I must say it wasn't what I would call playing the game. I know +there isn't supposed to be any sentiment in business, but after all we +had given Elsa her big chance. But Fillmore wouldn't put her name up +over the theatre in electrics, and Goble and Cohn made it a clause in +her contract that they would, so nothing else mattered. People are like +that." + +"But Elsa... She used not to be like that." + +"They all get that way. They must grab success if it's to be grabbed. +I suppose you can't blame them. You might just as well expect a cat to +keep off catnip. Still, she might have waited to the end of the New York +run." Mrs. Fillmore put out her hand and touched Sally's. "Well, I've +got it out now," she said, "and, believe me, it was one rotten job. You +don't know how sorry I am. Sally. I wouldn't have had it happen for a +million dollars. Nor would Fillmore. I'm not sure that I blame him for +getting cold feet and backing out of telling you himself. He just hadn't +the nerve to come and confess that he had fooled away your money. He was +hoping all along that this fight would pan out big and that he'd be able +to pay you back what you had loaned him, but things didn't happen +right." + +Sally was silent. She was thinking how strange it was that this room in +which she had hoped to be so happy had been from the first moment of her +occupancy a storm centre of bad news and miserable disillusionment. In +this first shock of the tidings, it was the disillusionment that hurt +most. She had always been so fond of Elsa, and Elsa had always seemed so +fond of her. She remembered that letter of Elsa's with all its +protestations of gratitude... It wasn't straight. It was horrible. +Callous, selfish, altogether horrible... + +"It's..." She choked, as a rush of indignation brought the tears to her +eyes. "It's... beastly! I'm... I'm not thinking about my money. That's +just bad luck. But Elsa..." + +Mrs. Fillmore shrugged her square shoulders. + +"Well, it's happening all the time in the show business," she said. +"And in every other business, too, I guess, if one only knew enough +about them to be able to say. Of course, it hits you hard because Elsa +was a pal of yours, and you're thinking she might have considered you +after all you've done for her. I can't say I'm much surprised myself." +Mrs. Fillmore was talking rapidly, and dimly Sally understood that she +was talking so that talk would carry her over this bad moment. Silence +now would have been unendurable. "I was in the company with her, and it +sometimes seems to me as if you can't get to know a person right through +till you've been in the same company with them. Elsa's all right, but +she's two people really, like these dual identity cases you read about. +She's awfully fond of you. I know she is. She was always saying so, and +it was quite genuine. If it didn't interfere with business there's +nothing she wouldn't do for you. But when it's a case of her career you +don't count. Nobody counts. Not even her husband. Now that's funny. If +you think that sort of thing funny. Personally, it gives me the +willies." + +"What's funny?" asked Sally, dully. + +"Well, you weren't there, so you didn't see it, but I was on the spot +all the time, and I know as well as I know anything that he simply +married her because he thought she could get him on in the game. He +hardly paid any attention to her at all till she was such a riot in +Chicago, and then he was all over her. And now he's got stung. She +throws down his show and goes off to another fellow's. It's like +marrying for money and finding the girl hasn't any. And she's got stung, +too, in a way, because I'm pretty sure she married him mostly because +she thought he was going to be the next big man in the play-writing +business and could boost her up the ladder. And now it doesn't look as +though he had another success in him. The result is they're at outs. I +hear he's drinking. Somebody who'd seen him told me he had gone all to +pieces. You haven't seen him, I suppose?" + +"No." + +"I thought maybe you might have run into him. He lives right opposite." + +Sally clutched at the arm of her chair. + +"Lives right opposite? Gerald Foster? What do you mean?" + +"Across the passage there," said Mrs. Fillmore, jerking her thumb at the +door. "Didn't you know? That's right, I suppose you didn't. They moved +in after you had beaten it for England. Elsa wanted to be near you, and +she was tickled to death when she found there was an apartment to be had +right across from you. Now, that just proves what I was saying a while +ago about Elsa. If she wasn't fond of you, would she go out of her way +to camp next door? And yet, though she's so fond of you, she doesn't +hesitate about wrecking your property by quitting the show when she +sees a chance of doing herself a bit of good. It's funny, isn't it?" + +The telephone-bell, tinkling sharply, rescued Sally from the necessity +of a reply. She forced herself across the room to answer it. + +"Hullo?" + +Ginger's voice spoke jubilantly. + +"Hullo. Are you there? I say, it's all right, about that binge, you +know." + +"Oh, yes?" + +"That dog fellow, you know," said Ginger, with a slight diminution of +exuberance. His sensitive ear had seemed to detect a lack of animation +in her voice. "I've just been talking to him over the 'phone, and it's +all settled. If," he added, with a touch of doubt, "you still feel like +going into it, I mean." + +There was an instant in which Sally hesitated, but it was only an +instant. + +"Why, of course," she said, steadily. "Why should you think I had +changed my mind?" + +"Well, I thought... that is to say, you seemed... oh, I don't know." + +"You imagine things. I was a little worried about something when you +called me up, and my mind wasn't working properly. Of course, go ahead +with it. Ginger. I'm delighted." + +"I say, I'm awfully sorry you're worried." + +"Oh. it's all right." + +"Something bad?" + +"Nothing that'll kill me. I'm young and strong." + +Ginger was silent for a moment. + +"I say, I don't want to butt in, but can I do anything?" + +"No, really, Ginger, I know you would do anything you could, but this is +just something I must worry through by myself. When do you go down to +this place?" + +"I was thinking of popping down this afternoon, just to take a look +round." + +"Let me know what train you're making and I'll come and see you off." + +"That's ripping of you. Right ho. Well, so long." + +"So long," said Sally. + +Mrs. Fillmore, who had been sitting in that state of suspended +animation which comes upon people who are present at a telephone +conversation which has nothing to do with themselves, came to life as +Sally replaced the receiver. + +"Sally," she said, "I think we ought to have a talk now about what +you're going to do." + +Sally was not feeling equal to any discussion of the future. All she +asked of the world at the moment was to be left alone. + +"Oh, that's all right. I shall manage. You ought to be worrying about +Fillmore." + +"Fillmore's got me to look after him," said Gladys, with quiet +determination. "You're the one that's on my mind. I lay awake all last +night thinking about you. As far as I can make out from Fillmore, you've +still a few thousand dollars left. Well, as it happens, I can put you on +to a really good thing. I know a girl..." + +"I'm afraid," interrupted Sally, "all the rest of my money, what there +is of it, is tied up." + +"You can't get hold of it?" + +"No." + +"But listen," said Mrs. Fillmore, urgently. "This is a really good +thing. This girl I know started an interior decorating business some +time ago and is pulling in the money in handfuls. But she wants more +capital, and she's willing to let go of a third of the business to +anyone who'll put in a few thousand. She won't have any difficulty +getting it, but I 'phoned her this morning to hold off till I'd heard +from you. Honestly, Sally, it's the chance of a lifetime. It would put +you right on easy street. Isn't there really any way you could get your +money out of this other thing and take on this deal?" + +"There really isn't. I'm awfully obliged to you, Gladys dear, but it's +impossible." + +"Well," said Mrs. Fillmore, prodding the carpet energetically with her +parasol, "I don't know what you've gone into, but, unless they've given +you a share in the Mint or something, you'll be losing by not making +the switch. You're sure you can't do it?" + +"I really can't." + +Mrs. Fillmore rose, plainly disappointed. + +"Well, you know best, of course. Gosh! What a muddle everything is. +Sally," she said, suddenly stopping at the door, "you're not going to +hate poor old Fillmore over this, are you?" + +"Why, of course not. The whole thing was just bad luck." + +"He's worried stiff about it." + +"Well, give him my love, and tell him not to be so silly." + +Mrs. Fillmore crossed the room and kissed Sally impulsively. + +"You're an angel," she said. "I wish there were more like you. But I +guess they've lost the pattern. Well, I'll go back and tell Fillmore +that. It'll relieve him." + +The door closed, and Sally sat down with her chin in her hands to think. + + + +3 + + + +Mr. Isadore Abrahams, the founder and proprietor of that deservedly +popular dancing resort poetically named "The Flower Garden," leaned back +in his chair with a contented sigh and laid down the knife and fork with +which he had been assailing a plateful of succulent goulash. He was +dining, as was his admirable custom, in the bosom of his family at his +residence at Far Rockaway. Across the table, his wife, Rebecca, beamed +at him over her comfortable plinth of chins, and round the table his +children, David, Jacob, Morris and Saide, would have beamed at him if +they had not been too busy at the moment ingurgitating goulash. A +genial, honest, domestic man was Mr. Abrahams, a credit to the +community. + +"Mother," he said. + +"Pa?" said Mrs. Abrahams. + +"Knew there was something I'd meant to tell you," said Mr. Abrahams, +absently chasing a piece of bread round his plate with a stout finger. +"You remember that girl I told you about some time back--girl working at +the Garden--girl called Nicholas, who came into a bit of money and +threw up her job..." + +"I remember. You liked her. Jakie, dear, don't gobble." + +"Ain't gobbling," said Master Abrahams. + +"Everybody liked her," said Mr. Abrahams. "The nicest girl I ever +hired, and I don't hire none but nice girls, because the Garden's a nice +place, and I like to run it nice. I wouldn't give you a nickel for any +of your tough joints where you get nothing but low-lifes and scare away +all the real folks. Everybody liked Sally Nicholas. Always pleasant and +always smiling, and never anything but the lady. It was a treat to have +her around. Well, what do you think?" + +"Dead?" inquired Mrs. Abrahams, apprehensively. The story had sounded +to her as though it were heading that way. "Wipe your mouth, Jakie +dear." + +"No, not dead," said Mr. Abrahams, conscious for the first time that the +remainder of his narrative might be considered by a critic something of +an anti-climax and lacking in drama. "But she was in to see me this +afternoon and wants her job back." + +"Ah!" said Mrs. Abrahams, rather tonelessly. An ardent supporter of the +local motion-picture palace, she had hoped for a slightly more gingery +denouement, something with a bit more punch. + +"Yes, but don't it show you?" continued Mr. Abrahams, gallantly trying +to work up the interest. "There's this girl, goes out of my place not +more'n a year ago, with a good bank-roll in her pocket, and here she is, +back again, all of it spent. Don't it show you what a tragedy life is, +if you see what I mean, and how careful one ought to be about money? +It's what I call a human document. Goodness knows how she's been and +gone and spent it all. I'd never have thought she was the sort of girl +to go gadding around. Always seemed to me to be kind of sensible." + +"What's gadding, Pop?" asked Master Jakie, the goulash having ceased to +chain his interest. + +"Well, she wanted her job back and I gave it to her, and glad to get her +back again. There's class to that girl. She's the sort of girl I want in +the place. Don't seem quite to have so much get-up in her as she used +to... seems kind of quieted down... but she's got class, and I'm glad +she's back. I hope she'll stay. But don't it show you?" + +"Ah!" said Mrs. Abrahams, with more enthusiasm than before. It had not +worked out such a bad story after all. In its essentials it was not +unlike the film she had seen the previous evening--Gloria Gooch in "A +Girl against the World." + +"Pop!" said Master Abrahams. + +"Yes, Jakie?" + +"When I'm grown up, I won't never lose no money. I'll put it in the +bank and save it." + +The slight depression caused by the contemplation of Sally's troubles +left Mr. Abrahams as mist melts beneath a sunbeam. + +"That's a good boy, Jakie," he said. + +He felt in his waistcoat pocket, found a dime, put it back again, and +bent forward and patted Master Abrahams on the head. + + + + + + + +CHAPTER XV + + + +UNCLE DONALD SPEAKS HIS MIND + + + +There is in certain men--and Bruce Carmyle was one of them--a quality of +resilience, a sturdy refusal to acknowledge defeat, which aids them as +effectively in affairs of the heart as in encounters of a sterner and +more practical kind. As a wooer, Bruce Carmyle resembled that durable +type of pugilist who can only give of his best after he has received at +least one substantial wallop on some tender spot. Although Sally had +refused his offer of marriage quite definitely at Monk's Crofton, it +had never occurred to him to consider the episode closed. All his life +he had been accustomed to getting what he wanted, and he meant to get +it now. + +He was quite sure that he wanted Sally. There had been moments when he +had been conscious of certain doubts, but in the smart of temporary +defeat these had vanished. That streak of Bohemianism in her which from +time to time since their first meeting had jarred upon his orderly mind +was forgotten; and all that Mr. Carmyle could remember was the +brightness of her eyes, the jaunty lift of her chin, and the gallant +trimness of her. Her gay prettiness seemed to flick at him like a whip +in the darkness of wakeful nights, lashing him to pursuit. And quietly +and methodically, like a respectable wolf settling on the trail of a +Red Riding Hood, he prepared to pursue. Delicacy and imagination might +have kept him back, but in these qualities he had never been strong. One +cannot have everything. + +His preparations for departure, though he did his best to make them +swiftly and secretly, did not escape the notice of the Family. In many +English families there seems to exist a system of inter-communication +and news-distribution like that of those savage tribes in Africa who +pass the latest item of news and interest from point to point over miles +of intervening jungle by some telepathic method never properly +explained. On his last night in London, there entered to Bruce Carmyle +at his apartment in South Audley Street, the Family's chosen +representative, the man to whom the Family pointed with pride--Uncle +Donald, in the flesh. + +There were two hundred and forty pounds of the flesh Uncle Donald was +in, and the chair in which he deposited it creaked beneath its burden. +Once, at Monk's Crofton, Sally had spoiled a whole morning for her +brother Fillmore, by indicating Uncle Donald as the exact image of what +he would be when he grew up. A superstition, cherished from early +schooldays, that he had a weak heart had caused the Family's managing +director to abstain from every form of exercise for nearly fifty years; +and, as he combined with a distaste for exercise one of the three +heartiest appetites in the south-western postal division of London, +Uncle Donald, at sixty-two, was not a man one would willingly have +lounging in one's armchairs. Bruce Carmyle's customary respectfulness +was tinged with something approaching dislike as he looked at him. + +Uncle Donald's walrus moustache heaved gently upon his laboured breath, +like seaweed on a ground-swell. There had been stairs to climb. + +"What's this? What's this?" he contrived to ejaculate at last. "You +packing?" + +"Yes," said Mr. Carmyle, shortly. For the first time in his life he was +conscious of that sensation of furtive guilt which was habitual with his +cousin Ginger when in the presence of this large, mackerel-eyed man. + +"You going away?" + +"Yes." + +"Where you going?" + +"America." + +"When you going?" + +"To-morrow morning." + +"Why you going?" + +This dialogue has been set down as though it had been as brisk and +snappy as any cross-talk between vaudeville comedians, but in reality +Uncle Donald's peculiar methods of conversation had stretched it over a +period of nearly three minutes: for after each reply and before each +question he had puffed and sighed and inhaled his moustache with such +painful deliberation that his companion's nerves were finding it +difficult to bear up under the strain. + +"You're going after that girl," said Uncle Donald, accusingly. + +Bruce Carmyle flushed darkly. And it is interesting to record that at +this moment there flitted through his mind the thought that Ginger's +behaviour at Bleke's Coffee House, on a certain notable occasion, had +not been so utterly inexcusable as he had supposed. There was no doubt +that the Family's Chosen One could be trying. + +"Will you have a whisky and soda, Uncle Donald?" he said, by way of +changing the conversation. + +"Yes," said his relative, in pursuance of a vow he had made in the early +eighties never to refuse an offer of this kind. "Gimme!" + +You would have thought that that would have put matters on a pleasanter +footing. But no. Having lapped up the restorative, Uncle Donald returned +to the attack quite un-softened. + +"Never thought you were a fool before," he said severely. + +Bruce Carmyle's proud spirit chafed. This sort of interview, which had +become a commonplace with his cousin Ginger, was new to him. Hitherto, +his actions had received neither criticism nor been subjected to it. + +"I'm not a fool." + +"You are a fool. A damn fool," continued Uncle Donald, specifying more +exactly. "Don't like the girl. Never did. Not a nice girl. Didn't like +her. Right from the first." + +"Need we discuss this?" said Bruce Carmyle, dropping, as he was apt to +do, into the grand manner. + +The Head of the Family drank in a layer of moustache and blew it out +again. + +"Need we discuss it?" he said with asperity. "We're going to discuss +it! Whatch think I climbed all these blasted stairs for with my weak +heart? Gimme another!" + +Mr. Carmyle gave him another. + +"'S a bad business," moaned Uncle Donald, having gone through the +movements once more. "Shocking bad business. If your poor father were +alive, whatch think he'd say to your tearing across the world after this +girl? I'll tell you what he'd say. He'd say... What kind of whisky's +this?" + +"O'Rafferty Special." + +"New to me. Not bad. Quite good. Sound. Mellow. Wherej get it?" + +"Bilby's in Oxford Street." + +"Must order some. Mellow. He'd say... well, God knows what he'd say. +Whatch doing it for? Whatch doing it for? That's what I can't see. None +of us can see. Puzzles your uncle George. Baffles your aunt Geraldine. +Nobody can understand it. Girl's simply after your money. Anyone can see +that." + +"Pardon me, Uncle Donald," said Mr. Carmyle, stiffly, "but that is +surely rather absurd. If that were the case, why should she have refused +me at Monk's Crofton?" + +"Drawing you on," said Uncle Donald, promptly. "Luring you on. +Well-known trick. Girl in 1881, when I was at Oxford, tried to lure me +on. If I hadn't had some sense and a weak heart... Whatch know of this +girl? Whatch know of her? That's the point. Who is she? Wherej meet +her?" + +"I met her at Roville, in France." + +"Travelling with her family?" + +"Travelling alone," said Bruce Carmyle, reluctantly. + +"Not even with that brother of hers? Bad!" said Uncle Donald. "Bad, +bad!" + +"American girls are accustomed to more independence than English girls." + +"That young man," said Uncle Donald, pursuing a train of thought, "is +going to be fat one of these days, if he doesn't look out. Travelling +alone, was she? What did you do? Catch her eye on the pier?" + +"Really, Uncle Donald!" + +"Well, must have got to know her somehow." + +"I was introduced to her by Lancelot. She was a friend of his." + +"Lancelot!" exploded Uncle Donald, quivering all over like a smitten +jelly at the loathed name. "Well, that shows you what sort of a girl she +is. Any girl that would be a friend of... Unpack!" + +"I beg your pardon?" + +"Unpack! Mustn't go on with this foolery. Out of the question. Find +some girl make you a good wife. Your aunt Mary's been meeting some +people name of Bassington-Bassington, related Kent +Bassington-Bassingtons... eldest daughter charming girl, just do for +you." + +Outside the pages of the more old-fashioned type of fiction nobody ever +really ground his teeth, but Bruce Carmyle came nearer to it at that +moment than anyone had ever come before. He scowled blackly, and the +last trace of suavity left him. + +"I shall do nothing of the kind," he said briefly. "I sail to-morrow." + +Uncle Donald had had a previous experience of being defied by a nephew, +but it had not accustomed him to the sensation. He was aware of an +unpleasant feeling of impotence. Nothing is harder than to know what to +do next when defied. + +"Eh?" he said. + +Mr. Carmyle having started to defy, evidently decided to make a good job +of it. + +"I am over twenty-one," said he. "I am financially independent. I +shall do as I please." + +"But, consider!" pleaded Uncle Donald, painfully conscious of the +weakness of his words. "Reflect!" + +"I have reflected." + +"Your position in the county..." + +"I've thought of that." + +"You could marry anyone you pleased." + +"I'm going to." + +"You are determined to go running off to God-knows-where after this Miss +I-can't-even-remember-her-dam-name?" + +"Yes." + +"Have you considered," said Uncle Donald, portentously, "that you owe a +duty to the Family." + +Bruce Carmyle's patience snapped and he sank like a stone to absolutely +Gingerian depths of plain-spokenness. + +"Oh, damn the Family!" he cried. + +There was a painful silence, broken only by the relieved sigh of the +armchair as Uncle Donald heaved himself out of it. + +"After that," said Uncle Donald, "I have nothing more to say." + +"Good!" said Mr. Carmyle rudely, lost to all shame. + +"'Cept this. If you come back married to that girl, I'll cut you in +Piccadilly. By George, I will!" + +He moved to the door. Bruce Carmyle looked down his nose without +speaking. A tense moment. + +"What," asked Uncle Donald, his fingers on the handle, "did you say it +was called?" + +"What was what called?" + +"That whisky." + +"O'Rafferty Special." + +"And wherj get it?" + +"Bilby's, in Oxford Street." + +"I'll make a note of it," said Uncle Donald. + + + + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + + + +AT THE FLOWER GARDEN + + + +1 + + + +"And after all I've done for her," said Mr. Reginald Cracknell, his +voice tremulous with self-pity and his eyes moist with the combined +effects of anguish and over-indulgence in his celebrated private stock, +"after all I've done for her she throws me down." + +Sally did not reply. The orchestra of the Flower Garden was of a +calibre that discouraged vocal competition; and she was having, +moreover, too much difficulty in adjusting her feet to Mr. Cracknell's +erratic dance-steps to employ her attention elsewhere. They manoeuvred +jerkily past the table where Miss Mabel Hobson, the Flower Garden's +newest "hostess," sat watching the revels with a distant hauteur. Miss +Hobson was looking her most regal in old gold and black, and a sorrowful +gulp escaped the stricken Mr. Cracknell as he shambled beneath her eye. + +"If I told you," he moaned in Sally's ear, "what... was that your ankle? +Sorry! Don't know what I'm doing to-night... If I told you what I had +spent on that woman, you wouldn't believe it. And then she throws me +down. And all because I said I didn't like her in that hat. She hasn't +spoken to me for a week, and won't answer when I call up on the 'phone. +And I was right, too. It was a rotten hat. Didn't suit her a bit. But +that," said Mr. Cracknell, morosely, "is a woman all over!" + +Sally uttered a stifled exclamation as his wandering foot descended on +hers before she could get it out of the way. Mr. Cracknell interpreted +the ejaculation as a protest against the sweeping harshness of his last +remark, and gallantly tried to make amends. + +"I don't mean you're like that," he said. "You're different. I could +see that directly I saw you. You have a sympathetic nature. That's why +I'm telling you all this. You're a sensible and broad-minded girl and +can understand. I've done everything for that woman. I got her this job +as hostess here--you wouldn't believe what they pay her. I starred her +in a show once. Did you see those pearls she was wearing? I gave her +those. And she won't speak to me. Just because I didn't like her hat. I +wish you could have seen that hat. You would agree with me, I know, +because you're a sensible, broad-minded girl and understand hats. I +don't know what to do. I come here every night." Sally was aware of +this. She had seen him often, but this was the first time that Lee +Schoenstein, the gentlemanly master of ceremonies, had inflicted him on +her. "I come here every night and dance past her table, but she won't +look at me. What," asked Mr. Cracknell, tears welling in his pale eyes, +"would you do about it?" + +"I don't know," said Sally, frankly. + +"Nor do I. I thought you wouldn't, because you're a sensible, +broad-minded... I mean, nor do I. I'm having one last try to-night, if +you can keep a secret. You won't tell anyone, will you?" pleaded Mr. +Cracknell, urgently. "But I know you won't because you're a sensible... +I'm giving her a little present. Having it brought here to-night. Little +present. That ought to soften her, don't you think?" + +"A big one would do it better." + +Mr. Cracknell kicked her on the shin in a dismayed sort of way. + +"I never thought of that. Perhaps you're right. But it's too late now. +Still, it might. Or wouldn't it? Which do you think?" + +"Yes," said Sally. + +"I thought as much," said Mr. Cracknell. + +The orchestra stopped with a thump and a bang, leaving Mr. Cracknell +clapping feebly in the middle of the floor. Sally slipped back to her +table. Her late partner, after an uncertain glance about him, as if he +had mislaid something but could not remember what, zigzagged off in +search of his own seat. The noise of many conversations, drowned by the +music, broke out with renewed vigour. The hot, close air was full of +voices; and Sally, pressing her hands on her closed eyes, was reminded +once more that she had a headache. + +Nearly a month had passed since her return to Mr. Abrahams' employment. +It had been a dull, leaden month, a monotonous succession of lifeless +days during which life had become a bad dream. In some strange nightmare +fashion, she seemed nowadays to be cut off from her kind. It was weeks +since she had seen a familiar face. None of the companions of her old +boarding-house days had crossed her path. Fillmore, no doubt from +uneasiness of conscience, had not sought her out, and Ginger was working +out his destiny on the south shore of Long Island. + +She lowered her hands and opened her eyes and looked at the room. It +was crowded, as always. The Flower Garden was one of the many +establishments of the same kind which had swum to popularity on the +rising flood of New York's dancing craze; and doubtless because, as its +proprietor had claimed, it was a nice place and run nice, it had +continued, unlike many of its rivals, to enjoy unvarying prosperity. In +its advertisement, it described itself as "a supper-club for +after-theatre dining and dancing," adding that "large and spacious, and +sumptuously appointed," it was "one of the town's wonder-places, with +its incomparable dance-floor, enchanting music, cuisine, and service de +luxe." From which it may be gathered, even without his personal +statements to that effect, that Isadore Abrahams thought well of the +place. + +There had been a time when Sally had liked it, too. In her first period +of employment there she had found it diverting, stimulating and full of +entertainment. But in those days she had never had headaches or, what +was worse, this dreadful listless depression which weighed her down and +made her nightly work a burden. + +"Miss Nicholas." + +The orchestra, never silent for long at the Flower Garden, had started +again, and Lee Schoenstein, the master of ceremonies, was presenting a +new partner. She got up mechanically. + +"This is the first time I have been in this place," said the man, as +they bumped over the crowded floor. He was big and clumsy, of course. +To-night it seemed to Sally that the whole world was big and clumsy. +"It's a swell place. I come from up-state myself. We got nothing like +this where I come from." He cleared a space before him, using Sally as a +battering-ram, and Sally, though she had not enjoyed her recent +excursion with Mr. Cracknell, now began to look back to it almost with +wistfulness. This man was undoubtedly the worst dancer in America. + +"Give me li'l old New York," said the man from up-state, +unpatriotically. "It's good enough for me. I been to some swell shows +since I got to town. You seen this year's 'Follies'?" + +"No." + +"You go," said the man earnestly. "You go! Take it from me, it's a +swell show. You seen 'Myrtle takes a Turkish Bath'?" + +"I don't go to many theatres." + +"You go! It's a scream. I been to a show every night since I got here. +Every night regular. Swell shows all of 'em, except this last one. I +cert'nly picked a lemon to-night all right. I was taking a chance, +y'see, because it was an opening. Thought it would be something to say, +when I got home, that I'd been to a New York opening. Set me back +two-seventy-five, including tax, and I wish I'd got it in my kick right +now. 'The Wild Rose,' they called it," he said satirically, as if +exposing a low subterfuge on the part of the management. "'The Wild +Rose!' It sure made me wild all right. Two dollars seventy-five tossed +away, just like that." + +Something stirred in Sally's memory. Why did that title seem so +familiar? Then, with a shock, she remembered. It was Gerald's new play. +For some time after her return to New York, she had been haunted by the +fear lest, coming out other apartment, she might meet him coming out of +his; and then she had seen a paragraph in her morning paper which had +relieved her of this apprehension. Gerald was out on the road with a new +play, and "The Wild Rose," she was almost sure, was the name of it. + +"Is that Gerald Foster's play?" she asked quickly. + +"I don't know who wrote it," said her partner, "but let me tell you he's +one lucky guy to get away alive. There's fellows breaking stones on the +Ossining Road that's done a lot less to deserve a sentence. Wild Rose! +I'll tell the world it made me go good and wild," said the man from +up-state, an economical soul who disliked waste and was accustomed to +spread out his humorous efforts so as to give them every chance. "Why, +before the second act was over, the people were beating it for the +exits, and if it hadn't been for someone shouting 'Women and children +first' there'd have been a panic." + +Sally found herself back at her table without knowing clearly how she +had got there. + +"Miss Nicholas." + +She started to rise, and was aware suddenly that this was not the voice +of duty calling her once more through the gold teeth of Mr. Schoenstein. +The man who had spoken her name had seated himself beside her, and was +talking in precise, clipped accents, oddly familiar. The mist cleared +from her eyes and she recognized Bruce Carmyle. + + + +2 + + + +"I called at your place," Mr. Carmyle was saying, "and the hall porter +told me that you were here, so I ventured to follow you. I hope you do +not mind? May I smoke?" + +He lit a cigarette with something of an air. His fingers trembled as he +raised the match, but he flattered himself that there was nothing else +in his demeanour to indicate that he was violently excited. Bruce +Carmyle's ideal was the strong man who can rise superior to his +emotions. He was alive to the fact that this was an embarrassing moment, +but he was determined not to show that he appreciated it. He cast a +sideways glance at Sally, and thought that never, not even in the garden +at Monk's Crofton on a certain momentous occasion, had he seen her +looking prettier. Her face was flushed and her eyes aflame. The stout +wraith of Uncle Donald, which had accompanied Mr. Carmyle on this +expedition of his, faded into nothingness as he gazed. + +There was a pause. Mr. Carmyle, having lighted his cigarette, puffed +vigorously. + +"When did you land?" asked Sally, feeling the need of saying something. +Her mind was confused. She could not have said whether she was glad or +sorry that he was there. Glad, she thought, on the whole. There was +something in his dark, cool, stiff English aspect that gave her a +curious feeling of relief. He was so unlike Mr. Cracknell and the man +from up-state and so calmly remote from the feverish atmosphere in +which she lived her nights that it was restful to look at him. + +"I landed to-night," said Bruce Carmyle, turning and faced her squarely. + +"To-night!" + +"We docked at ten." + +He turned away again. He had made his effect, and was content to leave +her to think it over. + +Sally was silent. The significance of his words had not escaped her. +She realized that his presence there was a challenge which she must +answer. And yet it hardly stirred her. She had been fighting so long, +and she felt utterly inert. She was like a swimmer who can battle no +longer and prepares to yield to the numbness of exhaustion. The heat of +the room pressed down on her like a smothering blanket. Her tired nerves +cried out under the blare of music and the clatter of voices. + +"Shall we dance this?" he asked. + +The orchestra had started to play again, a sensuous, creamy melody which +was making the most of its brief reign as Broadway's leading song-hit, +overfamiliar to her from a hundred repetitions. + +"If you like." + +Efficiency was Bruce Carmyle's gospel. He was one of these men who do +not attempt anything which they cannot accomplish to perfection. +Dancing, he had decided early in his life, was a part of a gentleman's +education, and he had seen to it that he was educated thoroughly. Sally, +who, as they swept out on to the floor, had braced herself automatically +for a repetition of the usual bumping struggle which dancing at the +Flower Garden had come to mean for her, found herself in the arms of a +masterful expert, a man who danced better than she did, and suddenly +there came to her a feeling that was almost gratitude, a miraculous +slackening of her taut nerves, a delicious peace. Soothed and +contented, she yielded herself with eyes half closed to the rhythm of +the melody, finding it now robbed in some mysterious manner of all its +stale cheapness, and in that moment her whole attitude towards Bruce +Carmyle underwent a complete change. + +She had never troubled to examine with any minuteness her feelings +towards him: but one thing she had known clearly since their first +meeting--that he was physically distasteful to her. For all his good +looks, and in his rather sinister way he was a handsome man, she had +shrunk from him. Now, spirited away by the magic of the dance, that +repugnance had left her. It was as if some barrier had been broken down +between them. + +"Sally!" + +She felt his arm tighten about her, the muscles quivering. She caught +sight of his face. His dark eyes suddenly blazed into hers and she +stumbled with an odd feeling of helplessness; realizing with a shock +that brought her with a jerk out of the half-dream into which she had +been lulled that this dance had not postponed the moment of decision, as +she had looked to it to do. In a hot whisper, the words swept away on +the flood of the music which had suddenly become raucous and blaring +once more, he was repeating what he had said under the trees at Monk's +Crofton on that far-off morning in the English springtime. Dizzily she +knew that she was resenting the unfairness of the attack at such a +moment, but her mind seemed numbed. + +The music stopped abruptly. Insistent clapping started it again, but +Sally moved away to her table, and he followed her like a shadow. +Neither spoke. Bruce Carmyle had said his say, and Sally was sitting +staring before her, trying to think. She was tired, tired. Her eyes were +burning. She tried to force herself to face the situation squarely. Was +it worth struggling? Was anything in the world worth a struggle? She +only knew that she was tired, desperately tired, tired to the very +depths of her soul. + +The music stopped. There was more clapping, but this time the orchestra +did not respond. Gradually the floor emptied. The shuffling of feet +ceased. The Flower Garden was as quiet as it was ever able to be. Even +the voices of the babblers seemed strangely hushed. Sally closed her +eyes, and as she did so from somewhere up near the roof there came the +song of a bird. + +Isadore Abrahams was a man of his word. He advertised a Flower Garden, +and he had tried to give the public something as closely resembling a +flower-garden as it was possible for an overcrowded, overheated, +overnoisy Broadway dancing-resort to achieve. Paper roses festooned the +walls; genuine tulips bloomed in tubs by every pillar; and from the roof +hung cages with birds in them. One of these, stirred by the sudden +cessation of the tumult below, had began to sing. + +Sally had often pitied these birds, and more than once had pleaded in +vain with Abrahams for a remission of their sentence, but somehow at +this moment it did not occur to her that this one was merely praying in +its own language, as she often had prayed in her thoughts, to be taken +out of this place. To her, sitting there wrestling with Fate, the song +seemed cheerful. It soothed her. It healed her to listen to it. And +suddenly before her eyes there rose a vision of Monk's Crofton, cool, +green, and peaceful under the mild English sun, luring her as an oasis +seen in the distance lures the desert traveller ... + +She became aware that the master of Monk's Crofton had placed his hand +on hers and was holding it in a tightening grip. She looked down and +gave a little shiver. She had always disliked Bruce Carmyle's hands. +They were strong and bony and black hair grew on the back of them. One +of the earliest feelings regarding him had been that she would hate to +have those hands touching her. But she did not move. Again that vision +of the old garden had flickered across her mind... a haven where she +could rest... + +He was leaning towards her, whispering in her ear. The room was hotter +than it had ever been, noisier than it had ever been, fuller than it had +ever been. The bird on the roof was singing again and now she understood +what it said. "Take me out of this!" Did anything matter except that? +What did it matter how one was taken, or where, or by whom, so that one +was taken. + +Monk's Crofton was looking cool and green and peaceful... + +"Very well," said Sally. + +3 + + + +Bruce Carmyle, in the capacity of accepted suitor, found himself at +something of a loss. He had a dissatisfied feeling. It was not the +manner of Sally's acceptance that caused this. It would, of course, have +pleased him better if she had shown more warmth, but he was prepared to +wait for warmth. What did trouble him was the fact that his correct mind +perceived now for the first time that he had chosen an unsuitable +moment and place for his outburst of emotion. He belonged to the +orthodox school of thought which looks on moonlight and solitude as the +proper setting for a proposal of marriage; and the surroundings of the +Flower Garden, for all its nice-ness and the nice manner in which it was +conducted, jarred upon him profoundly. + +Music had begun again, but it was not the soft music such as a lover +demands if he is to give of his best. It was a brassy, clashy rendering +of a ribald one-step, enough to choke the eloquence of the most ardent. +Couples were dipping and swaying and bumping into one another as far as +the eye could reach; while just behind him two waiters had halted in +order to thrash out one of those voluble arguments in which waiters love +to indulge. To continue the scene at the proper emotional level was +impossible, and Bruce Carmyle began his career as an engaged man by +dropping into Smalltalk. + +"Deuce of a lot of noise," he said querulously. + +"Yes," agreed Sally. + +"Is it always like this?" + +"Oh, yes." + +"Infernal racket!" + +"Yes." + +The romantic side of Mr. Carmyle's nature could have cried aloud at the +hideous unworthiness of these banalities. In the visions which he had +had of himself as a successful wooer, it had always been in the moments +immediately succeeding the all-important question and its whispered +reply that he had come out particularly strong. He had been accustomed +to picture himself bending with a proud tenderness over his partner in +the scene and murmuring some notably good things to her bowed head. How +could any man murmur in a pandemonium like this. From tenderness Bruce +Carmyle descended with a sharp swoop to irritability. + +"Do you often come here?" + +"Yes." + +"What for?" + +"To dance." + +Mr. Carmyle chafed helplessly. The scene, which should be so romantic, +had suddenly reminded him of the occasion when, at the age of twenty, he +had attended his first ball and had sat in a corner behind a potted palm +perspiring shyly and endeavouring to make conversation to a formidable +nymph in pink. It was one of the few occasions in his life at which he +had ever been at a complete disadvantage. He could still remember the +clammy discomfort of his too high collar as it melted on him. Most +certainly it was not a scene which he enjoyed recalling; and that he +should be forced to recall it now, at what ought to have been the +supreme moment of his life, annoyed him intensely. Almost angrily he +endeavoured to jerk the conversation to a higher level. + +"Darling," he murmured, for by moving his chair two feet to the right +and bending sideways he found that he was in a position to murmur, "you +have made me so..." + +"Batti, batti! I presto ravioli hollandaise," cried one of the disputing +waiters at his back--or to Bruce Carmyle's prejudiced hearing it +sounded like that. + +"La Donna e mobile spaghetti napoli Tettrazina," rejoined the second +waiter with spirit. + +"... you have made me so..." + +"Infanta Isabella lope de Vegas mulligatawny Toronto," said the first +waiter, weak but coming back pluckily. + +"... so happy..." + +"Funiculi funicula Vincente y Blasco Ibanez vermicelli sul campo della +gloria risotto!" said the second waiter clinchingly, and scored a +technical knockout. + +Bruce Carmyle gave it up, and lit a moody cigarette. He was oppressed +by that feeling which so many of us have felt in our time, that it was +all wrong. + +The music stopped. The two leading citizens of Little Italy vanished +and went their way, probably to start a vendetta. There followed +comparative calm. But Bruce Carmyle's emotions, like sweet bells +jangled, were out of tune, and he could not recapture the first fine +careless rapture. He found nothing within him but small-talk. + +"What has become of your party?" he asked. + +"My party?" + +"The people you are with," said Mr. Carmyle. Even in the stress of his +emotion this problem had been exercising him. In his correctly ordered +world girls did not go to restaurants alone. + +"I'm not with anybody." + +"You came here by yourself?" exclaimed Bruce Carmyle, frankly aghast. +And, as he spoke, the wraith of Uncle Donald, banished till now, +returned as large as ever, puffing disapproval through a walrus +moustache. + +"I am employed here," said Sally. + +Mr. Carmyle started violently. + +"Employed here?" + +"As a dancer, you know. I..." + +Sally broke off, her attention abruptly diverted to something which had +just caught her eye at a table on the other side of the room. That +something was a red-headed young man of sturdy build who had just +appeared beside the chair in which Mr. Reginald Cracknell was sitting in +huddled gloom. In one hand he carried a basket, and from this basket, +rising above the din of conversation, there came a sudden sharp yapping. +Mr. Cracknell roused himself from his stupor, took the basket, raised +the lid. The yapping increased in volume. + +Mr. Cracknell rose, the basket in his arms. With uncertain steps and a +look on his face like that of those who lead forlorn hopes he crossed +the floor to where Miss Mabel Hobson sat, proud and aloof. The next +moment that haughty lady, the centre of an admiring and curious crowd, +was hugging to her bosom a protesting Pekingese puppy, and Mr. +Cracknell, seizing his opportunity like a good general, had deposited +himself in a chair at her side. The course of true love was running +smooth again. + +The red-headed young man was gazing fixedly at Sally. + +"As a dancer!" ejaculated Mr. Carmyle. Of all those within sight of the +moving drama which had just taken place, he alone had paid no attention +to it. Replete as it was with human interest, sex-appeal, the punch, and +all the other qualities which a drama should possess, it had failed to +grip him. His thoughts had been elsewhere. The accusing figure of Uncle +Donald refused to vanish from his mental eye. The stern voice of Uncle +Donald seemed still to ring in his ear. + +A dancer! A professional dancer at a Broadway restaurant! Hideous doubts +began to creep like snakes into Bruce Carmyle's mind. What, he asked +himself, did he really know of this girl on whom he had bestowed the +priceless boon of his society for life? How did he know what she was--he +could not find the exact adjective to express his meaning, but he knew +what he meant. Was she worthy of the boon? That was what it amounted to. +All his life he had had a prim shrinking from the section of the +feminine world which is connected with the light-life of large cities. +Club acquaintances of his in London had from time to time married into +the Gaiety Chorus, and Mr. Carmyle, though he had no objection to the +Gaiety Chorus in its proper place--on the other side of the +footlights--had always looked on these young men after as social +outcasts. The fine dashing frenzy which had brought him all the way from +South Audley Street to win Sally was ebbing fast. + +Sally, hearing him speak, had turned. And there was a candid honesty in +her gaze which for a moment sent all those creeping doubts scuttling +away into the darkness whence they had come. He had not made a fool of +himself, he protested to the lowering phantom of Uncle Donald. Who, he +demanded, could look at Sally and think for an instant that she was not +all that was perfect and lovable? A warm revulsion of feeling swept over +Bruce Carmyle like a returning tide. + +"You see, I lost my money and had to do something," said Sally. + +"I see, I see," murmured Mr. Carmyle; and if only Fate had left him +alone who knows to what heights of tenderness he might not have soared? +But at this moment Fate, being no respecter of persons, sent into his +life the disturbing personality of George Washington Williams. + +George Washington Williams was the talented coloured gentleman who had +been extracted from small-time vaudeville by Mr. Abrahams to do a +nightly speciality at the Flower Garden. He was, in fact, a +trap-drummer: and it was his amiable practice, after he had done a few +minutes trap-drumming, to rise from his seat and make a circular tour of +the tables on the edge of the dancing-floor, whimsically pretending to +clip the locks of the male patrons with a pair of drumsticks held +scissor-wise. And so it came about that, just as Mr. Carmyle was bending +towards Sally in an access of manly sentiment, and was on the very verge +of pouring out his soul in a series of well-phrased remarks, he was +surprised and annoyed to find an Ethiopian to whom he had never been +introduced leaning over him and taking quite unpardonable liberties with +his back hair. + +One says that Mr. Carmyle was annoyed. The word is weak. The +interruption coming at such a moment jarred every ganglion in his body. +The clicking noise of the drumsticks maddened him. And the gleaming +whiteness of Mr. Williams' friendly and benignant smile was the last +straw. His dignity writhed beneath this abominable infliction. People at +other tables were laughing. At him. A loathing for the Flower Garden +flowed over Bruce Carmyle, and with it a feeling of suspicion and +disapproval of everyone connected with the establishment. He sprang to +his feet. + +"I think I will be going," he said. + +Sally did not reply. She was watching Ginger, who still stood beside +the table recently vacated by Reginald Cracknell . + +"Good night," said Mr. Carmyle between his teeth. + +"Oh, are you going?" said Sally with a start. She felt embarrassed. +Try as she would, she was unable to find words of any intimacy. She +tried to realize that she had promised to marry this man, but never +before had he seemed so much a stranger to her, so little a part of her +life. It came to her with a sensation of the incredible that she had +done this thing, taken this irrevocable step. + +The sudden sight of Ginger had shaken her. It was as though in the last +half-hour she had forgotten him and only now realized what marriage with +Bruce Carmyle would mean to their comradeship. From now on he was dead +to her. If anything in this world was certain that was. Sally Nicholas +was Ginger's pal, but Mrs. Carmyle, she realized, would never be allowed +to see him again. A devastating feeling of loss smote her like a blow. + +"Yes, I've had enough of this place," Bruce Carmyle was saying. + +"Good night," said Sally. She hesitated. "When shall I see you?" she +asked awkwardly. + +It occurred to Bruce Carmyle that he was not showing himself at his +best. He had, he perceived, allowed his nerves to run away with him. + +"You don't mind if I go?" he said more amiably. "The fact is, I can't +stand this place any longer. I'll tell you one thing, I'm going to take +you out of here quick." + +"I'm afraid I can't leave at a moment's notice," said Sally, loyal to +her obligations. + +"We'll talk over that to-morrow. I'll call for you in the morning and +take you for a drive somewhere in a car. You want some fresh air after +this." Mr. Carmyle looked about him in stiff disgust, and expressed his +unalterable sentiments concerning the Flower Garden, that apple of +Isadore Abrahams' eye, in a snort of loathing. "My God! What a place!" + +He walked quickly away and disappeared. And Ginger, beaming happily, +swooped on Sally's table like a homing pigeon. + + + +4 + + + +"Good Lord, I say, what ho!" cried Ginger. "Fancy meeting you here. +What a bit of luck!" He glanced over his shoulder warily. "Has that +blighter pipped?" + +"Pipped?" + +"Popped," explained Ginger. "I mean to say, he isn't coming back or any +rot like that, is he?" + +"Mr. Carmyle? No, he has gone." + +"Sound egg!" said Ginger with satisfaction. "For a moment, when I saw +you yarning away together, I thought he might be with your party. What +on earth is he doing over here at all, confound him? He's got all Europe +to play about in, why should he come infesting New York? I say, it +really is ripping, seeing you again. It seems years... Of course, one +get's a certain amount of satisfaction writing letters, but it's not the +same. Besides, I write such rotten letters. I say, this really is rather +priceless. Can't I get you something? A cup of coffee, I mean, or an egg +or something? By jove! this really is top-hole." + +His homely, honest face glowed with pleasure, and it seemed to Sally as +though she had come out of a winter's night into a warm friendly room. +Her mercurial spirits soared. + +"Oh, Ginger! If you knew what it's like seeing you!" + +"No, really? Do you mean, honestly, you're braced?" + +"I should say I am braced." + +"Well, isn't that fine! I was afraid you might have forgotten me." + +"Forgotten you!" + +With something of the effect of a revelation it suddenly struck Sally +how far she had been from forgetting him, how large was the place he had +occupied in her thoughts. + +"I've missed you dreadfully," she said, and felt the words inadequate as +she uttered them. + +"What ho!" said Ginger, also internally condemning the poverty of speech +as a vehicle for conveying thought. + +There was a brief silence. The first exhilaration of the reunion over, +Sally deep down in her heart was aware of a troubled feeling as though +the world were out of joint. She forced herself to ignore it, but it +would not be ignored. It grew. Dimly she was beginning to realize what +Ginger meant to her, and she fought to keep herself from realizing it. +Strange things were happening to her to-night, strange emotions stirring +her. Ginger seemed somehow different, as if she were really seeing him +for the first time. + +"You're looking wonderfully well," she said trying to keep the +conversation on a pedestrian level. + +"I am well," said Ginger. "Never felt fitter in my life. Been out in +the open all day long... simple life and all that... working like +blazes. I say, business is booming. Did you see me just now, handing +over Percy the Pup to what's-his-name? Five hundred dollars on that one +deal. Got the cheque in my pocket. But what an extraordinarily rummy +thing that I should have come to this place to deliver the goods just +when you happened to be here. I couldn't believe my eyes at first. I +say, I hope the people you're with won't think I'm butting in. You'll +have to explain that we're old pals and that you started me in business +and all that sort of thing. Look here," he said lowering his voice, "I +know how you hate being thanked, but I simply must say how terrifically +decent..." + +"Miss Nicholas." + +Lee Schoenstein was standing at the table, and by his side an expectant +youth with a small moustache and pince-nez. Sally got up, and the next +moment Ginger was alone, gaping perplexedly after her as she vanished +and reappeared in the jogging throng on the dancing floor. It was the +nearest thing Ginger had seen to a conjuring trick, and at that moment +he was ill-attuned to conjuring tricks. He brooded, fuming, at what +seemed to him the supremest exhibition of pure cheek, of monumental +nerve, and of undiluted crust that had ever come within his notice. To +come and charge into a private conversation like that and whisk her away +without a word... + +"Who was that blighter?" he demanded with heat, when the music ceased +and Sally limped back. + +"That was Mr. Schoenstein." + +"And who was the other?" + +"The one I danced with? I don't know." + +"You don't know?" + +Sally perceived that the conversation had arrived at an embarrassing +point. There was nothing for it but candour. + +"Ginger," she said, "you remember my telling you when we first met that +I used to dance in a Broadway place? This is the place. I'm working +again." + +Complete unintelligence showed itself on Ginger's every feature. + +"I don't understand," he said--unnecessarily, for his face revealed the +fact. + +"I've got my old job back." + +"But why?" + +"Well, I had to do something." She went on rapidly. Already a light +dimly resembling the light of understanding was beginning to appear in +Ginger's eyes. "Fillmore went smash, you know--it wasn't his fault, poor +dear. He had the worst kind of luck--and most of my money was tied up in +his business, so you see..." + +She broke off confused by the look in his eyes, conscious of an absurd +feeling of guilt. There was amazement in that look and a sort of +incredulous horror. + +"Do you mean to say..." Ginger gulped and started again. "Do you mean +to tell me that you let me have... all that money... for the +dog-business... when you were broke? Do you mean to say..." + +Sally stole a glance at his crimson face and looked away again quickly. +There was an electric silence. + +"Look here," exploded Ginger with sudden violence, "you've got to marry +me. You've jolly well got to marry me! I don't mean that," he added +quickly. "I mean to say I know you're going to marry whoever you +please... but won't you marry me? Sally, for God's sake have a dash at +it! I've been keeping it in all this time because it seemed rather +rotten to bother you about it, but now... .Oh, dammit, I wish I could +put it into words. I always was rotten at talking. But... well, look +here, what I mean is, I know I'm not much of a chap, but it seems to me +you must care for me a bit to do a thing like that for a fellow... +and... I've loved you like the dickens ever since I met you... I do wish +you'd have a stab at it, Sally. At least I could look after you, you +know, and all that... I mean to say, work like the deuce and try to give +you a good time... I'm not such an ass as to think a girl like you could +ever really... er... love a blighter like me, but..." + +Sally laid her hand oh his. + +"Ginger, dear," she said, "I do love you. I ought to have known it all +along, but I seem to be understanding myself to-night for the first +time." She got up and bent over him for a swift moment, whispering in +his ear, "I shall never love anyone but you, Ginger. Will you try to +remember that." She was moving away, but he caught at her arm and +stopped her. + +"Sally..." + +She pulled her arm away, her face working as she fought against the +tears that would not keep back. + +"I've made a fool of myself," she said. "Ginger, your cousin... Mr. +Carmyle... just now he asked me to marry him, and I said I would." + +She was gone, flitting among the tables like some wild creature running +to its home: and Ginger, motionless, watched her go. + + + +5 + + + +The telephone-bell in Sally's little sitting-room was ringing jerkily as +she let herself in at the front door. She guessed who it was at the +other end of the wire, and the noise of the bell sounded to her like the +voice of a friend in distress crying for help. Without stopping to close +the door, she ran to the table and unhooked the receiver. Muffled, +plaintive sounds were comming over the wire. + +"Hullo... Hullo... I say... Hullo..." + +"Hullo, Ginger," said Sally quietly. + +An ejaculation that was half a shout and half gurgle answered her. + +"Sally! Is that you?" + +"Yes, here I am, Ginger." + +"I've been trying to get you for ages." + +"I've only just come in. I walked home." + +There was a pause. + +"Hullo." + +"Yes?" + +"Well, I mean..." Ginger seemed to be finding his usual difficulty in +expressing himself. "About that, you know. What you said." + +"Yes?" said Sally, trying to keep her voice from shaking. + +"You said..." Again Ginger's vocabulary failed him. "You said you loved +me." + +"Yes," said Sally simply. + +Another odd sound floated over the wire, and there was a moment of +silence before Ginger found himself able to resume. + +"I... I... Well, we can talk about that when we meet. I mean, it's no +good trying to say what I think over the 'phone, I'm sort of knocked +out. I never dreamed... But, I say, what did you mean about Bruce?" + +"I told you, I told you." Sally's face was twisted and the receiver +shook in her hand. "I've made a fool of myself. I never realized... And +now it's too late." + +"Good God!" Ginger's voice rose in a sharp wail. "You can't mean you +really... You don't seriously intend to marry the man?" + +"I must. I've promised." + +"But, good heavens..." + +"It's no good. I must." + +"But the man's a blighter!" + +"I can't break my word." + +"I never heard such rot," said Ginger vehemently. "Of course you can. +A girl isn't expected..." + +"I can't, Ginger dear, I really can't." + +"But look here..." + +"It's really no good talking about it any more, really it isn't... Where +are you staying to-night?" + +"Staying? Me? At the Plaza. But look here..." + +Sally found herself laughing weakly. + +"At the Plaza! Oh, Ginger, you really do want somebody to look after +you. Squandering your pennies like that... Well, don't talk any more +now. It's so late and I'm so tired. I'll come and see you to-morrow. +Good night." + +She hung up the receiver quickly, to cut short a fresh outburst of +protest. And as she turned away a voice spoke behind her. + +"Sally!" + +Gerald Foster was standing in the doorway. + + + + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + + + +SALLY LAYS A GHOST + + + +1 + + + +The blood flowed slowly back into Sally's face, and her heart, which +had leaped madly for an instant at the sound of his voice, resumed its +normal beat. The suddenness of the shock over, she was surprised to find +herself perfectly calm. Always when she had imagined this meeting, +knowing that it would have to take place sooner or later, she had felt +something akin to panic: but now that it had actually occurred it hardly +seemed to stir her. The events of the night had left her incapable of +any violent emotion. + +"Hullo, Sally!" said Gerald. + +He spoke thickly, and there was a foolish smile on his face as he stood +swaying with one hand on the door. He was in his shirt-sleeves, +collarless: and it was plain that he had been drinking heavily. His face +was white and puffy, and about him there hung like a nimbus a sodden +disreputableness. + +Sally did not speak. Weighed down before by a numbing exhaustion, she +seemed now to have passed into that second phase in which over-tired +nerves enter upon a sort of Indian summer of abnormal alertness. She +looked at him quietly, coolly and altogether dispassionately, as if he +had been a stranger. + +"Hullo!" said Gerald again. + +"What do you want?" said Sally. + +"Heard your voice. Saw the door open. Thought I'd come in." + +"What do you want?" + +The weak smile which had seemed pinned on Gerald's face vanished. A +tear rolled down his cheek. His intoxication had reached the maudlin +stage. + +"Sally... S-Sally... I'm very miserable." He slurred awkwardly over the +difficult syllables. "Heard your voice. Saw the door open. Thought I'd +come in." + +Something flicked at the back of Sally's mind. She seemed to have been +through all this before. Then she remembered. This was simply Mr. +Reginald Cracknell over again. + +"I think you had better go to bed, Gerald," she said steadily. Nothing +about him seemed to touch her now, neither the sight of him nor his +shameless misery. + +"What's the use? Can't sleep. No good. Couldn't sleep. Sally, you +don't know how worried I am. I see what a fool I've been." + +Sally made a quick gesture, to check what she supposed was about to +develop into a belated expression of regret for his treatment of +herself. She did not want to stand there listening to Gerald apologizing +with tears for having done his best to wreck her life. But it seemed +that it was not this that was weighing upon his soul. + +"I was a fool ever to try writing plays," he went on. "Got a winner +first time, but can't repeat. It's no good. Ought to have stuck to +newspaper work. I'm good at that. Shall have to go back to it. Had +another frost to-night. No good trying any more. Shall have to go back +to the old grind, damn it." + +He wept softly, full of pity for his hard case. + +"Very miserable," he murmured. + +He came forward a step into the room, lurched, and retreated to the +safe support of the door. For an instant Sally's artificial calm was +shot through by a swift stab of contempt. It passed, and she was back +again in her armour of indifference. + +"Go to bed, Gerald," she said. "You'll feel better in the morning." + +Perhaps some inkling of how he was going to feel in the morning worked +through to Gerald's muddled intelligence, for he winced, and his manner +took on a deeper melancholy. + +"May not be alive in the morning," he said solemnly. "Good mind to end +it all. End it all!" he repeated with the beginning of a sweeping +gesture which was cut off abruptly as he clutched at the friendly door. + +Sally was not in the mood for melodrama. + +"Oh, go to bed," she said impatiently. The strange frozen indifference +which had gripped her was beginning to pass, leaving in its place a +growing feeling of resentment--resentment against Gerald for degrading +himself like this, against herself for ever having found glamour in the +man. It humiliated her to remember how utterly she had once allowed his +personality to master hers. And under the sting of this humiliation she +felt hard and pitiless. Dimly she was aware that a curious change had +come over her to-night. Normally, the sight of any living thing in +distress was enough to stir her quick sympathy: but Gerald mourning over +the prospect of having to go back to regular work made no appeal to +her--a fact which the sufferer noted and commented upon. + +"You're very unsymp... unsympathetic," he complained. + +"I'm sorry," said Sally. She walked briskly to the door and gave it a +push. Gerald, still clinging to his chosen support, moved out into the +passage, attached to the handle, with the air of a man the foundations +of whose world have suddenly lost their stability. He released the +handle and moved uncertainly across the passage. Finding his own door +open before him, he staggered over the threshold; and Sally, having +watched him safely to his journey's end, went into her bedroom with the +intention of terminating this disturbing night by going to sleep. + +Almost immediately she changed her mind. Sleep was out of the question. +A fever of restlessness had come upon her. She put on a kimono, and went +into the kitchen to ascertain whether her commissariat arrangements +would permit of a glass of hot milk. + +She had just remembered that she had that morning presented the last of +the milk to a sandy cat with a purposeful eye which had dropped in +through the window to take breakfast with her, when her regrets for +this thriftless hospitality were interrupted by a muffled crash. + +She listened intently. The sound had seemed to come from across the +passage. She hurried to the door and opened it. As she did so, from +behind the door of the apartment opposite there came a perfect fusillade +of crashes, each seeming to her strained hearing louder and more +appalling than the last. + +There is something about sudden, loud noises in the stillness of the +night which shatters the most rigid detachment. A short while before, +Gerald, toying with the idea of ending his sorrows by violence, had left +Sally unmoved: but now her mind leapt back to what he had said, and +apprehension succeeded indifference. There was no disputing the fact +that Gerald was in an irresponsible mood, under the influence of which +he was capable of doing almost anything. Sally, listening in the +doorway, felt a momentary panic. + +A brief silence had succeeded the fusillade, but, as she stood there +hesitating, the noise broke out again; and this time it was so loud and +compelling that Sally hesitated no longer. She ran across the passage +and beat on the door. + + + +2 + + + +Whatever devastating happenings had been going on in his home, it was +plain a moment later that Gerald had managed to survive them: for there +came the sound of a dragging footstep, and the door opened. Gerald stood +on the threshold, the weak smile back on his face. + +"Hullo, Sally!" + +At the sight of him, disreputable and obviously unscathed, Sally's +brief alarm died away, leaving in its place the old feeling of impatient +resentment. In addition to her other grievances against him, he had +apparently frightened her unnecessarily. + +"Whatever was all that noise?" she demanded. + +"Noise?" said Gerald, considering the point open-mouthed. + +"Yes, noise," snapped Sally. + +"I've been cleaning house," said Gerald with the owl-like gravity of a +man just conscious that he is not wholly himself. + +Sally pushed her way past him. The apartment in which she found herself +was almost an exact replica of her own, and it was evident that Elsa +Doland had taken pains to make it pretty and comfortable in a niggly +feminine way. Amateur interior decoration had always been a hobby of +hers. Even in the unpromising surroundings of her bedroom at Mrs. +Meecher's boarding-house she had contrived to create a certain +daintiness which Sally, who had no ability in that direction herself, +had always rather envied. As a decorator Elsa's mind ran in the +direction of small, fragile ornaments, and she was not afraid of +over-furnishing. Pictures jostled one another on the walls: china of all +description stood about on little tables: there was a profusion of lamps +with shades of parti-coloured glass: and plates were ranged along a +series of shelves. + +One says that the plates were ranged and the pictures jostled one +another, but it would be more correct to put it they had jostled and had +been ranged, for it was only by guess-work that Sally was able to +reconstruct the scene as it must have appeared before Gerald had +started, as he put it, to clean house. She had walked into the flat +briskly enough, but she pulled up short as she crossed the threshold, +appalled by the majestic ruin that met her gaze. A shell bursting in the +little sitting-room could hardly have created more havoc. + +The psychology of a man of weak character under the influence of alcohol +and disappointed ambition is not easy to plumb, for his moods follow one +another with a rapidity which baffles the observer. Ten minutes before, +Gerald Foster had been in the grip of a clammy self-pity, and it seemed +from his aspect at the present moment that this phase had returned. But +in the interval there had manifestly occurred a brief but adequate spasm +of what would appear to have been an almost Berserk fury. What had +caused it and why it should have expended itself so abruptly, Sally was +not psychologist enough to explain; but that it had existed there was +ocular evidence of the most convincing kind. A heavy niblick, flung +petulantly--or remorsefully--into a corner, showed by what medium the +destruction had been accomplished. + +Bleak chaos appeared on every side. The floor was littered with every +imaginable shape and size of broken glass and china. Fragments of +pictures, looking as if they had been chewed by some prehistoric animal, +lay amid heaps of shattered statuettes and vases. As Sally moved slowly +into the room after her involuntary pause, china crackled beneath her +feet. She surveyed the stripped walls with a wondering eye, and turned +to Gerald for an explanation. + +Gerald had subsided on to an occasional table, and was weeping softly +again. It had come over him once more that he had been very, very badly +treated. + +"Well!" said Sally with a gasp. "You've certainly made a good job of +it!" + +There was a sharp crack as the occasional table, never designed by its +maker to bear heavy weights, gave way in a splintering flurry of broken +legs under the pressure of the master of the house: and Sally's mood +underwent an abrupt change. There are few situations in life which do +not hold equal potentialities for both tragedy and farce, and it was the +ludicrous side of this drama that chanced to appeal to Sally at this +moment. Her sense of humour was tickled. It was, if she could have +analysed her feelings, at herself that she was mocking--at the feeble +sentimental Sally who had once conceived the absurd idea of taking this +preposterous man seriously. She felt light-hearted and light-headed, and +she sank into a chair with a gurgling laugh. + +The shock of his fall appeared to have had the desirable effect of +restoring Gerald to something approaching intelligence. He picked +himself up from the remains of a set of water-colours, gazing at Sally +with growing disapproval. + +"No sympathy," he said austerely. + +"I can't help it," cried Sally. "It's too funny." + +"Not funny," corrected Gerald, his brain beginning to cloud once more. + +"What did you do it for?" + +Gerald returned for a moment to that mood of honest indignation, which +had so strengthened his arm when wielding the niblick. He bethought him +once again of his grievance. + +"Wasn't going to stand for it any longer," he said heatedly. "A +fellow's wife goes and lets him down... ruins his show by going off and +playing in another show... why shouldn't I smash her things? Why should +I stand for that sort of treatment? Why should I?" + +"Well, you haven't," said Sally, "so there's no need to discuss it. You +seem to have acted in a thoroughly manly and independent way." + +"That's it. Manly independent." He waggled his finger impressively. +"Don't care what she says," he continued. "Don't care if she never comes +back. That woman..." + +Sally was not prepared to embark with him upon a discussion of the +absent Elsa. Already the amusing aspect of the affair had begun to fade, +and her hilarity was giving way to a tired distaste for the sordidness +of the whole business. She had become aware that she could not endure +the society of Gerald Foster much longer. She got up and spoke +decidedly. + +"And now," she said, "I'm going to tidy up." + +Gerald had other views. + +"No," he said with sudden solemnity. "No! Nothing of the kind. Leave +it for her to find. Leave it as it is." + +"Don't be silly. All this has got to be cleaned up. I'll do it. You +go and sit in my apartment. I'll come and tell you when you can come +back." + +"No!" said Gerald, wagging his head. + +Sally stamped her foot among the crackling ruins. Quite suddenly the +sight of him had become intolerable. + +"Do as I tell you," she cried. + +Gerald wavered for a moment, but his brief militant mood was ebbing +fast. After a faint protest he shuffled off, and Sally heard him go into +her room. She breathed a deep breath of relief and turned to her task. + +A visit to the kitchen revealed a long-handled broom, and, armed with +this, Sally was soon busy. She was an efficient little person, and +presently out of chaos there began to emerge a certain order. Nothing +short of complete re-decoration would ever make the place look habitable +again, but at the end of half an hour she had cleared the floor, and the +fragments of vases, plates, lamp-shades, pictures and glasses were +stacked in tiny heaps against the walls. She returned the broom to the +kitchen, and, going back into the sitting-room, flung open the window +and stood looking out. + +With a sense of unreality she perceived that the night had gone. Over +the quiet street below there brooded that strange, metallic light which +ushers in the dawn of a fine day. A cold breeze whispered to and fro. +Above the house-tops the sky was a faint, level blue. + +She left the window and started to cross the room. And suddenly there +came over her a feeling of utter weakness. She stumbled to a chair, +conscious only of being tired beyond the possibility of a further +effort. Her eyes closed, and almost before her head had touched the +cushions she was asleep. + + + +3 + + + +Sally woke. Sunshine was streaming through the open window, and with it +the myriad noises of a city awake and about its business. Footsteps +clattered on the sidewalk, automobile horns were sounding, and she could +hear the clank of street cars as they passed over the points. She could +only guess at the hour, but it was evident that the morning was well +advanced. She got up stiffly. Her head was aching. + +She went into the bathroom, bathed her face, and felt better. The dull +oppression which comes of a bad night was leaving her. She leaned out of +the window, revelling in the fresh air, then crossed the passage and +entered her own apartment. Stertorous breathing greeted her, and she +perceived that Gerald Foster had also passed the night in a chair. He +was sprawling by the window with his legs stretched out and his head +resting on one of the arms, an unlovely spectacle. + +Sally stood regarding him for a moment with a return of the distaste +which she had felt on the previous night. And yet, mingled with the +distaste, there was a certain elation. A black chapter of her life was +closed for ever. Whatever the years to come might bring to her, they +would be free from any wistful yearnings for the man who had once been +woven so inextricably into the fabric of her life. She had thought that +his personality had gripped her too strongly ever to be dislodged, but +now she could look at him calmly and feel only a faint half-pity, +half-contempt. The glamour had departed. + +She shook him gently, and he sat up with a start, blinking in the strong +light. His mouth was still open. He stared at Sally foolishly, then +scrambled awkwardly out of the chair. + +"Oh, my God!" said Gerald, pressing both his hands to his forehead and +sitting down again. He licked his lips with a dry tongue and moaned. +"Oh, I've got a headache!" + +Sally might have pointed out to him that he had certainly earned one, +but she refrained. + +"You'd better go and have a wash," she suggested. + +"Yes," said Gerald, heaving himself up again. + +"Would you like some breakfast?" + +"Don't!" said Gerald faintly, and tottered off to the bathroom. + +Sally sat down in the chair he had vacated. She had never felt quite +like this before in her life. Everything seemed dreamlike. The splashing +of water in the bathroom came faintly to her, and she realized that she +had been on the point of falling asleep again. She got up and opened the +window, and once more the air acted as a restorative. She watched the +activities of the street with a distant interest. They, too, seemed +dreamlike and unreal. People were hurrying up and down on mysterious +errands. An inscrutable cat picked its way daintily across the road. At +the door of the apartment house an open car purred sleepily. + +She was roused by a ring at the bell. She went to the door and opened +it, and found Bruce Carmyle standing on the threshold. He wore a light +motor-coat, and he was plainly endeavouring to soften the severity of +his saturnine face with a smile of beaming kindliness. + +"Well, here I am!" said Bruce Carmyle cheerily. "Are you ready?" + +With the coming of daylight a certain penitence had descended on Mr. +Carmyle. Thinking things over while shaving and subsequently in his +bath, he had come to the conclusion that his behaviour overnight had not +been all that could have been desired. He had not actually been brutal, +perhaps, but he had undoubtedly not been winning. There had been an +abruptness in the manner of his leaving Sally at the Flower Garden which +a perfect lover ought not to have shown. He had allowed his nerves to +get the better of him, and now he desired to make amends. Hence a +cheerfulness which he did not usually exhibit so early in the morning. + +Sally was staring at him blankly. She had completely forgotten that he +had said that he would come and take her for a drive this morning. She +searched in her mind for words, and found none. And, as Mr. Carmyle was +debating within himself whether to kiss her now or wait for a more +suitable moment, embarrassment came upon them both like a fog, and the +genial smile faded from his face as if the motive-power behind it had +suddenly failed. + +"I've--er--got the car outside, and..." + +At this point speech failed Mr. Carmyle, for, even as he began the +sentence, the door that led to the bathroom opened and Gerald Foster +came out. Mr. Carmyle gaped at Gerald: Gerald gaped at Mr. Carmyle. + +The application of cold water to the face and head is an excellent thing +on the morning after an imprudent night, but as a tonic it only goes +part of the way. In the case of Gerald Foster, which was an extremely +serious and aggravated case, it had gone hardly any way at all. The +person unknown who had been driving red-hot rivets into the base of +Gerald Foster's skull ever since the moment of his awakening was still +busily engaged on that task. He gazed at Mr. Carmyle wanly. + +Bruce Carmyle drew in his breath with a sharp hiss, and stood rigid. +His eyes, burning now with a grim light, flickered over Gerald's person +and found nothing in it to entertain them. He saw a slouching figure in +shirt-sleeves and the foundations of evening dress, a disgusting, +degraded figure with pink eyes and a white face that needed a shave. And +all the doubts that had ever come to vex Mr. Carmyle's mind since his +first meeting with Sally became on the instant certainties. So Uncle +Donald had been right after all! This was the sort of girl she was! + +At his elbow the stout phantom of Uncle Donald puffed with satisfaction. + +"I told you so!" it said. + +Sally had not moved. The situation was beyond her. Just as if this had +really been the dream it seemed, she felt incapable of speech or action. + +"So..." said Mr. Carmyle, becoming articulate, and allowed an impressive +aposiopesis to take the place of the rest of the speech. A cold fury had +gripped him. He pointed at Gerald, began to speak, found that he was +stuttering, and gulped back the words. In this supreme moment he was not +going to have his dignity impaired by a stutter. He gulped and found a +sentence which, while brief enough to insure against this disaster, was +sufficiently long to express his meaning. + +"Get out!" he said. + +Gerald Foster had his dignity, too, and it seemed to him that the time +had come to assert it. But he also had a most excruciating headache, and +when he drew himself up haughtily to ask Mr. Carmyle what the devil he +meant by it, a severe access of pain sent him huddling back immediately +to a safer attitude. He clasped his forehead and groaned. + +"Get out!" + +For a moment Gerald hesitated. Then another sudden shooting spasm +convinced him that no profit or pleasure was to be derived from a +continuance of the argument, and he began to shamble slowly across to +the door. Bruce Carmyle watched him go with twitching hands. There was a +moment when the human man in him, somewhat atrophied from long disuse, +stirred him almost to the point of assault; then dignity whispered more +prudent counsel in his ear, and Gerald was past the danger-zone and out +in the passage. Mr. Carmyle turned to face Sally, as King Arthur on a +similar but less impressive occasion must have turned to deal with +Guinevere. + +"So..." he said again. + +Sally was eyeing him steadily--considering the circumstances, Mr. +Carmyle thought with not a little indignation, much too steadily. + +"This," he said ponderously, "is very amusing." + +He waited for her to speak, but she said nothing. + +"I might have expected it," said Mr. Carmyle with a bitter laugh. + +Sally forced herself from the lethargy which was gripping her. + +"Would you like me to explain?" she said. + +"There can be no explanation," said Mr. Carmyle coldly. + +"Very well," said Sally. + +There was a pause. + +"Good-bye," said Bruce Carmyle. + +"Good-bye," said Sally. + +Mr. Carmyle walked to the door. There he stopped for an instant and +glanced back at her. Sally had walked to the window and was looking out. +For one swift instant something about her trim little figure and the +gleam of her hair where the sunlight shone on it seemed to catch at +Bruce Carmyle's heart, and he wavered. But the next moment he was strong +again, and the door had closed behind him with a resolute bang. + +Out in the street, climbing into his car, he looked up involuntarily to +see if she was still there, but she had gone. As the car, gathering +speed, hummed down the street. Sally was at the telephone listening to +the sleepy voice of Ginger Kemp, which, as he became aware who it was +that had woken him from his rest and what she had to say to him, +magically lost its sleepiness and took on a note of riotous ecstasy. + +Five minutes later, Ginger was splashing in his bath, singing +discordantly. + + + + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + + + +JOURNEY'S END + + + +Darkness was beginning to gather slowly and with almost an apologetic +air, as if it regretted the painful duty of putting an end to the +perfect summer day. Over to the west beyond the trees there still +lingered a faint afterglow, and a new moon shone like a silver sickle +above the big barn. Sally came out of the house and bowed gravely three +times for luck. She stood on the gravel, outside the porch, drinking in +the sweet evening scents, and found life good. + +The darkness, having shown a certain reluctance at the start, was now +buckling down to make a quick and thorough job of it. The sky turned to +a uniform dark blue, picked out with quiet stars. The cement of the +state road which led to Patchogue, Babylon, and other important centres +ceased to be a pale blur and became invisible. Lights appeared in the +windows of the houses across the meadows. From the direction of the +kennels there came a single sleepy bark, and the small white woolly dog +which had scampered out at Sally's heels stopped short and uttered a +challenging squeak. + +The evening was so still that Ginger's footsteps, as he pounded along +the road on his way back from the village, whither he had gone to buy +provisions, evening papers, and wool for the sweater which Sally was +knitting, were audible long before he turned in at the gate. Sally could +not see him, but she looked in the direction of the sound and once again +felt that pleasant, cosy thrill of happiness which had come to her every +evening for the last year. + +"Ginger," she called. + +"What ho!" + +The woolly dog, with another important squeak, scuttled down the drive +to look into the matter, and was coldly greeted. Ginger, for all his +love of dogs, had never been able to bring himself to regard Toto with +affection. He had protested when Sally, a month before, finding Mrs. +Meecher distraught on account of a dreadful lethargy which had seized +her pet, had begged him to offer hospitality and country air to the +invalid. + +"It's wonderful what you've done for Toto, angel," said Sally, as he +came up frigidly eluding that curious animal's leaps of welcome. "He's a +different dog." + +"Bit of luck for him," said Ginger. + +"In all the years I was at Mrs. Meecher's I never knew him move at +anything more rapid than a stately walk. Now he runs about all the +time." + +"The blighter had been overeating from birth," said Ginger. "That was +all that was wrong with him. A little judicious dieting put him right. +We'll be able," said Ginger brightening, "to ship him back next week." + +"I shall quite miss him." + +"I nearly missed him--this morning--with a shoe," said Ginger. "He was +up on the kitchen table wolfing the bacon, and I took steps." + +"My cave-man!" murmured Sally. "I always said you had a frightfully +brutal streak in you. Ginger, what an evening!" + +"Good Lord!" said Ginger suddenly, as they walked into the light of the +open kitchen door. + +"Now what?" + +He stopped and eyed her intently. + +"Do you know you're looking prettier than you were when I started down +to the village!" + +Sally gave his arm a little hug. + +"Beloved!" she said. "Did you get the chops?" + +Ginger froze in his tracks, horrified. + +"Oh, my aunt! I clean forgot them!" + +"Oh, Ginger, you are an old chump. Well, you'll have to go in for a +little judicious dieting, like Toto." + +"I say, I'm most awfully sorry. I got the wool." + +"If you think I'm going to eat wool..." + +"Isn't there anything in the house?" + +"Vegetables and fruit." + +"Fine! But, of course, if you want chops..." + +"Not at all. I'm spiritual. Besides, people say that vegetables are +good for the blood-pressure or something. Of course you forgot to get +the mail, too?" + +"Absolutely not! I was on to it like a knife. Two letters from fellows +wanting Airedale puppies." + +"No! Ginger, we are getting on!" + +"Pretty bloated," agreed Ginger complacently. "Pretty bloated. We'll +be able to get that two-seater if things go buzzing on like this. There +was a letter for you. Here it is." + +"It's from Fillmore," said Sally, examining the envelope as they went +into the kitchen. "And about time, too. I haven't had a word from him +for months." + +She sat down and opened the letter. Ginger, heaving himself on to the +table, wriggled into a position of comfort and started to read his +evening paper. But after he had skimmed over the sporting page he +lowered it and allowed his gaze to rest on Sally's bent head with a +feeling of utter contentment. + +Although a married man of nearly a year's standing, Ginger was still +moving about a magic world in a state of dazed incredulity, unable fully +to realize that such bliss could be. Ginger in his time had seen many +things that looked good from a distance, but not one that had borne the +test of a closer acquaintance--except this business of marriage. + +Marriage, with Sally for a partner, seemed to be one of the very few +things in the world in which there was no catch. His honest eyes glowed +as he watched her. Sally broke into a little splutter of laughter. + +"Ginger, look at this!" + +He reached down and took the slip of paper which she held out to him. +The following legend met his eye, printed in bold letters: + + POPP'S + + OUTSTANDING + + SUCCULENT----APPETIZING----NUTRITIOUS. + + + + (JUST SAY "POP!" A CHILD + + CAN DO IT.) + + + +Ginger regarded this cipher with a puzzled frown. + +"What is it?" he asked. + +"It's Fillmore." + +"How do you mean?" + +Sally gurgled. + +"Fillmore and Gladys have started a little restaurant in Pittsburg." + +"A restaurant!" There was a shocked note in Ginger's voice. Although he +knew that the managerial career of that modern Napoleon, his +brother-in-law, had terminated in something of a smash, he had never +quite lost his reverence for one whom he considered a bit of a +master-mind. That Fillmore Nicholas, the Man of Destiny, should have +descended to conducting a restaurant--and a little restaurant at +that--struck him as almost indecent. + +Sally, on the other hand--for sisters always seem to fail in proper +reverence for the greatness of their brothers--was delighted. + +"It's the most splendid idea," she said with enthusiasm. "It really +does look as if Fillmore was going to amount to something at last. +Apparently they started on quite a small scale, just making +pork-pies..." + +"Why Popp?" interrupted Ginger, ventilating a question which was +perplexing him deeply. + +"Just a trade name, silly. Gladys is a wonderful cook, you know, and +she made the pies and Fillmore toddled round selling them. And they did +so well that now they've started a regular restaurant, and that's a +success, too. Listen to this." Sally gurgled again and turned over the +letter. "Where is it? Oh yes! '... sound financial footing. In fact, our +success has been so instantaneous that I have decided to launch out on a +really big scale. It is Big Ideas that lead to Big Business. I am +contemplating a vast extension of this venture of ours, and in a very +short time I shall organize branches in New York, Chicago, Detroit, and +all the big cities, each in charge of a manager and each offering as a +special feature, in addition to the usual restaurant cuisine, these +Popp's Outstanding Pork-pies of ours. That done, and having established +all these branches as going concerns, I shall sail for England and +introduce Popp's Pork-pies there...' Isn't he a little wonder!" + +"Dashed brainy chap. Always said so." + +"I must say I was rather uneasy when I read that. I've seen so many of +Fillmore's Big Ideas. That's always the way with him. He gets something +good and then goes and overdoes it and bursts. However, it's all right +now that he's got Gladys to look after him. She has added a postscript. +Just four words, but oh! how comforting to a sister's heart. 'Yes, I +don't think!' is what she says, and I don't know when I've read anything +more cheering. Thank heaven, she's got poor dear Fillmore well in hand." + +"Pork-pies!" said Ginger, musingly, as the pangs of a healthy hunger +began to assail his interior. "I wish he'd sent us one of the +outstanding little chaps. I could do with it." + +Sally got up and ruffled his red hair. + +"Poor old Ginger! I knew you'd never be able to stick it. Come on, it's +a lovely night, lets walk to the village and revel at the inn. We're +going to be millionaires before we know where we are, so we can afford +it." + + + + + +THE END + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Adventures of Sally, by P. G. 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Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing +this or any other Project Gutenberg eBook. + +This header should be the first thing seen when viewing this Project +Gutenberg file. Please do not remove it. Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: The Adventures of Sally + +Author: P. G. Wodehouse + +Release Date: February, 2005 [EBook #7464] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on May 4, 2003] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII, with a few ISO-8859-1 characters + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ADVENTURES OF SALLY *** + + + + +Produced by Tim Barnett + + + + + + +</pre> + + + +<h1>The Adventures of Sally</h1> +<h1>by P. G. Wodehouse</h1> + +<h3 class="chap">CHAPTER I</h3> + +<h3 class="titl">SALLY GIVES A PARTY</h3> + +<h3 class="sect">1</h3> + +<p class="normal">Sally +looked contentedly down the long table. She felt happy at last. +Everybody was talking and laughing now, and her party, rallying after +an uncertain start, was plainly the success she had hoped it would +be. The first atmosphere of uncomfortable restraint, caused, she was +only too well aware, by her brother Fillmore’s white evening +waistcoat, had worn off; and the male and female patrons of Mrs. +Meecher’s select boarding-house (transient and residential) +were themselves again.</p> + +<p class="normal">At +her end of the table the conversation had turned once more to the +great vital topic of Sally’s legacy and what she ought to do +with it. The next best thing to having money of one’s own, is +to dictate the spending of somebody else’s, and Sally’s +guests were finding a good deal of satisfaction in arranging a Budget +for her. Rumour having put the sum at their disposal at a high +figure, their suggestions had certain spaciousness.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Let +me tell you,” said Augustus Bartlett, briskly, “what I’d +do, if I were you.” Augustus Bartlett, who occupied an +intensely subordinate position in the firm of Kahn, Morris and Brown, +the Wall Street brokers, always affected a brisk, incisive style of +speech, as befitted a man in close touch with the great ones of +Finance. “I’d sink a couple of hundred thousand in some +good, safe bond-issue—we’ve just put one out which you +would do well to consider—and play about with the rest. When I +say play about, I mean have a flutter in anything good that crops up. + Multiple Steel’s worth looking at. They tell me it’ll +be up to a hundred and fifty before next Saturday.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Elsa +Doland, the pretty girl with the big eyes who sat on Mr. Bartlett’s +left, had other views.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Buy +a theatre. Sally, and put on good stuff.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +lose every bean you’ve got,” said a mild young man, with +a deep voice across the table. “If I had a few hundred +thousand,” said the mild young man, “I’d put every +cent of it on Benny Whistler for the heavyweight championship. I’ve +private information that Battling Tuke has been got at and means to +lie down in the seventh...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Say, +listen,” interrupted another voice, “lemme tell you what +I’d do with four hundred thousand...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +I had four hundred thousand,” said Elsa Doland, “I know +what would be the first thing I’d do.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What’s +that?” asked Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Pay +my bill for last week, due this morning.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +got up quickly, and flitting down the table, put her arm round her +friend’s shoulder and whispered in her ear:</p> + +<p class="normal">“Elsa +darling, are you really broke? If you are, you know, I’ll...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Elsa +Doland laughed.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’re +an angel, Sally. There’s no one like you. You’d give +your last cent to anyone. Of course I’m not broke. I’ve +just come back from the road, and I’ve saved a fortune. I only +said that to draw you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +returned to her seat, relieved, and found that the company had now +divided itself into two schools of thought. The conservative and +prudent element, led by Augustus Bartlett, had definitely decided on +three hundred thousand in Liberty Bonds and the rest in some safe +real estate; while the smaller, more sporting section, impressed by +the mild young man’s inside information, had already placed +Sally’s money on Benny Whistler, doling it out cautiously in +small sums so as not to spoil the market. And so solid, it seemed, +was Mr. Tuke’s reputation with those in the inner circle of +knowledge that the mild young man was confident that, if you went +about the matter cannily and without precipitation, three to one +might be obtained. It seemed to Sally that the time had come to +correct certain misapprehensions</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t know where you get your figures,” she said, “but +I’m afraid they’re wrong. I’ve just twenty-five +thousand dollars.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +statement had a chilling effect. To these jugglers with +half-millions the amount mentioned seemed for the moment almost too +small to bother about. It was the sort of sum which they had been +mentally setting aside for the heiress’s car fare. Then they +managed to adjust their minds to it. After all, one could do +something even with a pittance like twenty-five thousand.</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +I’d twenty-five thousand,” said Augustus Bartlett, the +first to rally from the shock, “I’d buy Amalgamated...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +I had twenty-five thousand...” began Elsa Doland.</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +I’d had twenty-five thousand in the year nineteen hundred,” +observed a gloomy-looking man with spectacles, “I could have +started a revolution in Paraguay.”</p> + +<p class="normal">He +brooded sombrely on what might have been.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +I’ll tell you exactly what I’m going to do,” said +Sally. “I’m going to start with a trip to Europe... +France, specially. I’ve heard France well spoken of—as +soon as I can get my passport; and after I’ve loafed there for +a few weeks, I’m coming back to look about and find some nice +cosy little business which will let me put money into it and keep me +in luxury. Are there any complaints?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Even +a couple of thousand on Benny Whistler...”said the mild young +man.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t want your Benny Whistler,” said Sally. “I +wouldn’t have him if you gave him to me. If I want to lose +money, I’ll go to Monte Carlo and do it properly.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Monte +Carlo,” said the gloomy man, brightening up at the magic name. +“I was in Monte Carlo in the year ’97, and if I’d +had another fifty dollars... just fifty... I’d have...”</p> + +<p class="normal">At +the far end of the table there was a stir, a cough, and the grating +of a chair” on the floor; and slowly, with that easy grace +which actors of the old school learned in the days when acting was +acting, Mr. Maxwell Faucitt, the boarding-house’s oldest +inhabitant, rose to his feet.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ladies,” +said Mr. Faucitt, bowing courteously, “and...” ceasing to +bow and casting from beneath his white and venerable eyebrows a +quelling glance at certain male members of the boarding-house’s +younger set who were showing a disposition towards restiveness, “... +gentlemen. I feel that I cannot allow this occasion to pass without +saying a few words.”</p> + +<p class="normal">His +audience did not seem surprised. It was possible that life, always +prolific of incident in a great city like New York, might some day +produce an occasion which Mr. Faucitt would feel that he could allow +to pass without saying a few words; but nothing of the sort had +happened as yet, and they had given up hope. Right from the start of +the meal they had felt that it would be optimism run mad to expect +the old gentleman to abstain from speech on the night of Sally +Nicholas’ farewell dinner party; and partly because they had +braced themselves to it, but principally because Miss Nicholas’ +hospitality had left them with a genial feeling of repletion, they +settled themselves to listen with something resembling equanimity. A +movement on the part of the Marvellous Murphys—new arrivals, +who had been playing the Bush-wick with their equilibristic act +during the preceding week—to form a party of the extreme left +and heckle the speaker, broke down under a cold look from their +hostess. Brief though their acquaintance had been, both of these +lissom young gentlemen admired Sally immensely.</p> + +<p class="normal">And +it should be set on record that this admiration of theirs was not +misplaced. He would have been hard to please who had not been +attracted by Sally. She was a small, trim, wisp of a girl with the +tiniest hands and feet, the friendliest of smiles, and a dimple that +came and went in the curve of her rounded chin. Her eyes, which +disappeared when she laughed, which was often, were a bright hazel; +her hair a soft mass of brown. She had, moreover, a manner, an air +of distinction lacking in the majority of Mrs. Meecher’s +guests. And she carried youth like a banner. In approving of Sally, +the Marvellous Murphys had been guilty of no lapse from their high +critical standard.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +have been asked,” proceeded Mr. Faucitt, “though I am +aware that there are others here far worthier of such a task—Brutuses +compared with whom I, like Marc Antony, am no orator—I have +been asked to propose the health...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Who +asked you?” It was the smaller of the Marvellous Murphys who +spoke. He was an unpleasant youth, snub-nosed and spotty. Still, he +could balance himself with one hand on an inverted ginger-ale bottle +while revolving a barrel on the soles of his feet. There is good in +all of us.</p> + +<p class="normal"> +“I have been asked,” repeated Mr. Faucitt, ignoring the +unmannerly interruption, which, indeed, he would have found it hard +to answer, “to propose the health of our charming hostess +(applause), coupled with the name of her brother, our old friend +Fillmore Nicholas.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +gentleman referred to, who sat at the speaker’s end of the +table, acknowledged the tribute with a brief nod of the head. It was +a nod of condescension; the nod of one who, conscious of being hedged +about by social inferiors, nevertheless does his best to be not +unkindly. And Sally, seeing it, debated in her mind for an instant +the advisability of throwing an orange at her brother. There was one +lying ready to her hand, and his glistening shirt-front offered an +admirable mark; but she restrained herself. After all, if a hostess +yields to her primitive impulses, what happens? Chaos. She had just +frowned down the exuberance of the rebellious Murphys, and she felt +that if, even with the highest motives, she began throwing fruit, her +influence for good in that quarter would be weakened.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +leaned back with a sigh. The temptation had been hard to resist. A +democratic girl, pomposity was a quality which she thoroughly +disliked; and though she loved him, she could not disguise from +herself that, ever since affluence had descended upon him some months +ago, her brother Fillmore had become insufferably pompous. If there +are any young men whom inherited wealth improves, Fillmore Nicholas +was not one of them. He seemed to regard himself nowadays as a sort +of Man of Destiny. To converse with him was for the ordinary human +being like being received in audience by some more than stand-offish +monarch. It had taken Sally over an hour to persuade him to leave +his apartment on Riverside Drive and revisit the boarding-house for +this special occasion; and, when he had come, he had entered wearing +such faultless evening dress that he had made the rest of the party +look like a gathering of tramp-cyclists. His white waistcoat alone +was a silent reproach to honest poverty, and had caused an awkward +constraint right through the soup and fish courses. Most of those +present had known Fillmore Nicholas as an impecunious young man who +could make a tweed suit last longer than one would have believed +possible; they had called him “Fill” and helped him in +more than usually lean times with small loans: but to-night they had +eyed the waistcoat dumbly and shrank back abashed.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Speaking,” +said Mr. Faucitt, “as an Englishman—for though I have +long since taken out what are technically known as my ‘papers’ +it was as a subject of the island kingdom that I first visited this +great country—I may say that the two factors in American life +which have always made the profoundest impression upon me have been +the lavishness of American hospitality and the charm of the American +girl. To-night we have been privileged to witness the American girl +in the capacity of hostess, and I think I am right in saying, in +asseverating, in committing myself to the statement that his has been +a night which none of us present here will ever forget. Miss +Nicholas has given us, ladies and gentlemen, a banquet. I repeat, a +banquet. There has been alcoholic refreshment. I do not know where +it came from: I do not ask how it was procured, but we have had it. +Miss Nicholas…”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Faucitt paused to puff at his cigar. Sally’s brother Fillmore +suppressed a yawn and glanced at his watch. Sally continued to lean +forward raptly. She knew how happy it made the old gentleman to +deliver a formal speech; and though she wished the subject had been +different, she was prepared to listen indefinitely.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Miss +Nicholas,” resumed Mr. Faucitt, lowering his cigar, “... +But why,” he demanded abruptly, “do I call her Miss +Nicholas?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Because +it’s her name,” hazarded the taller Murphy.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Faucitt eyed him with disfavour. He disapproved of the marvellous +brethren on general grounds because, himself a resident of years +standing, he considered that these transients from the vaudeville +stage lowered the tone of the boarding-house; but particularly +because the one who had just spoken had, on his first evening in the +place, addressed him as “grandpa.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +sir,” he said severely, “it is her name. But she has +another name, sweeter to those who love her, those who worship her, +those who have watched her with the eye of sedulous affection through +the three years she has spent beneath this roof, though that <i>name,”</i> +said Mr. Faucitt, lowering the tone of his address and descending to +what might almost be termed personalities, “may not be familiar +to a couple of dud acrobats who have only been in the place a +week-end, thank heaven, and are off to-morrow to infest some other +city. That name,” said Mr. Faucitt, soaring once more to a +loftier plane, “is Sally. Our Sally. For three years our +Sally has flitted about this establishment like—I choose the +simile advisedly—like a ray of sunshine. For three years she +has made life for us a brighter, sweeter thing. And now a sudden +access of worldly wealth, happily synchronizing with her twenty-first +birthday, is to remove her from our midst. From our midst, ladies +and gentlemen, but not from our hearts. And I think I may venture to +hope, to prognosticate, that, whatever lofty sphere she may adorn in +the future, to whatever heights in the social world she may soar, she +will still continue to hold a corner in her own golden heart for the +comrades of her Bohemian days. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you our +hostess, Miss Sally Nicholas, coupled with the name of our old +friend, her brother Fillmore.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally, +watching her brother heave himself to his feet as the cheers died +away, felt her heart beat a little faster with anticipation. +Fillmore was a fluent young man, once a power in his college debating +society, and it was for that reason that she had insisted on his +coming here tonight.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +had guessed that Mr. Faucitt, the old dear, would say all sorts of +delightful things about her, and she had mistrusted her ability to +make a fitting reply. And it was imperative that a fitting reply +should proceed from someone. She knew Mr. Faucitt so well. He +looked on these occasions rather in the light of scenes from some +play; and, sustaining his own part in them with such polished grace, +was certain to be pained by anything in the nature of an anti-climax +after he should have ceased to take the stage. Eloquent himself, he +must be answered with eloquence, or his whole evening would be +spoiled.</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +Nicholas smoothed a wrinkle out of his white waistcoat; and having +rested one podgy hand on the table-cloth and the thumb of the other +in his pocket, glanced down the table with eyes so haughtily drooping +that Sally’s fingers closed automatically about her orange, as +she wondered whether even now it might not be a good thing... +</p> + +<p class="normal">It +seems to be one of Nature’s laws that the most attractive girls +should have the least attractive brothers. Fillmore Nicholas had not +worn well. At the age of seven he had been an extraordinarily +beautiful child, but after that he had gone all to pieces; and now, +at the age of twenty-five, it would be idle to deny that he was +something of a mess. For the three years preceding his twenty-fifth +birthday, restricted means and hard work had kept his figure in +check; but with money there had come an ever-increasing sleekness. +He looked as if he fed too often and too well.</p> + +<p class="normal">All +this, however, Sally was prepared to forgive him, if he would only +make a good speech. She could see Mr. Faucitt leaning back in his +chair, all courteous attention. Rolling periods were meat and drink +to the old gentleman.</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +spoke.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +sure,” said Fillmore, “you don’t want a speech... +Very good of you to drink our health. Thank you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">He +sat down.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +effect of these few simple words on the company was marked, but not +in every case identical. To the majority the emotion which they +brought was one of unmixed relief. There had been something so +menacing, so easy and practised, in Fillmore’s attitude as he +had stood there that the gloomier-minded had given him at least +twenty minutes, and even the optimists had reckoned that they would +be lucky if they got off with ten. As far as the bulk of the guests +were concerned, there was no grumbling. Fillmore’s, to their +thinking, had been the ideal after-dinner speech.</p> + +<p class="normal">Far +different was it with Mr. Maxwell Faucitt. The poor old man was +wearing such an expression of surprise and dismay as he might have +worn had somebody unexpectedly pulled the chair from under him. He +was feeling the sick shock which comes to those who tread on a +non-existent last stair. And Sally, catching sight of his face, +uttered a sharp wordless exclamation as if she had seen a child fall +down and hurt itself in the street. The next moment she had run +round the table and was standing behind him with her arms round his +neck. She spoke across him with a sob in her voice.</p> + +<p class="normal">“My +brother,” she stammered, directing a malevolent look at the +immaculate Fillmore, who, avoiding her gaze, glanced down his nose +and smoothed another wrinkle out of his waistcoat, “has not +said quite—quite all I hoped he was going to say. I can’t +make a speech, but...” Sally gulped, “... but, I love you +all and of course I shall never forget you, and... and...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Here +Sally kissed Mr. Faucitt and burst into tears.</p> + +<p class="normal">“There, +there,” said Mr. Faucitt, soothingly. The kindest critic could +not have claimed that Sally had been eloquent: nevertheless Mr. +Maxwell Faucitt was conscious of no sense of anti-climax.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">2</h3> + +<p class="normal">Sally +had just finished telling her brother Fillmore what a pig he was. +The lecture had taken place in the street outside the boarding-house +immediately on the conclusion of the festivities, when Fillmore, who +had furtively collected his hat and overcoat, had stolen forth into +the night, had been overtaken and brought to bay by his justly +indignant sister. Her remarks, punctuated at intervals by bleating +sounds from the accused, had lasted some ten minutes.</p> + +<p class="normal">As +she paused for breath, Fillmore seemed to expand, like an indiarubber +ball which has been sat on. Dignified as he was to the world, he had +never been able to prevent himself being intimidated by Sally when in +one of these moods of hers. He regretted this, for it hurt his +self-esteem, but he did not see how the fact could be altered. Sally +had always been like that. Even the uncle, who after the deaths of +their parents had become their guardian, had never, though a grim +man, been able to cope successfully with Sally. In that last hectic +scene three years ago, which had ended in their going out into the +world, together like a second Adam and Eve, the verbal victory had +been hers. And it had been Sally who had achieved triumph in the one +battle which Mrs. Meecher, apparently as a matter of duty, always +brought about with each of her patrons in the first week of their +stay. A sweet-tempered girl, Sally, like most women of a generous +spirit, had cyclonic potentialities.</p> + +<p class="normal">As +she seemed to have said her say, Fillmore kept on expanding till he +had reached the normal, when he ventured upon a speech for the +defence.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +have <i>I </i>done?” demanded Fillmore plaintively.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do +you want to hear all over again?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +no,” said Fillmore hastily. “But, listen. Sally, you +don’t understand my position. You don’t seem to realize +that all that sort of thing, all that boarding-house stuff, is a +thing of the past. One’s got beyond it. One wants to drop it. + One wants to forget it, darn it! Be fair. Look at it from my +viewpoint. I’m going to be a big man …”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’re +going to be a fat man,” said Sally, coldly.</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +refrained from discussing the point. He was sensitive.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +going to do big things,” he substituted. “I’ve got +a deal on at this very moment which... well, I can’t tell you +about it, but it’s going to be big. Well, what I’m +driving at, is about all this sort of thing”—he indicated +the lighted front of Mrs. Meecher’s home-from-home with a wide +gesture—”is that it’s over. Finished and done +with. These people were all very well when...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“... +when you’d lost your week’s salary at poker and wanted to +borrow a few dollars for the rent.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +always paid them back,” protested Fillmore, defensively.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +did.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +<i>we</i> did,” said Fillmore, accepting the amendment with the +air of a man who has no time for chopping straws. “Anyway, +what I mean is, I don’t see why, just because one has known +people at a certain period in one’s life when one was +practically down and out, one should have them round one’s neck +for ever. One can’t prevent people forming an I-knew-him-when +club, but, darn it, one needn’t attend the meetings.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“One’s +friends...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +<i>friends,”</i> said Fillmore. “That’s just where +all this makes me so tired. One’s in a position where all +these people are entitled to call themselves one’s friends, +simply because father put it in his will that I wasn’t to get +the money till I was twenty-five, instead of letting me have it at +twenty-one like anybody else. I wonder where I should have been by +now if I could have got that money when I was twenty-one.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“In +the poor-house, probably,” said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +was wounded.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ah! +you don’t believe in me,” he sighed.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +you would be all right if you had one thing,” said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +passed his qualities in swift review before his mental eye. Brains? +Dash? Spaciousness? Initiative? All present and correct. He wondered +where Sally imagined the hiatus to exist.</p> + +<p class="normal">“One +thing?” he said. “What’s that?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“A +nurse.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore’s +sense of injury deepened. He supposed that this was always the way, +that those nearest to a man never believed in his ability till he had +proved it so masterfully that it no longer required the assistance of +faith. Still, it was trying; and there was not much consolation to +be derived from the thought that Napoleon had had to go through this +sort of thing in his day. “I shall find my place in the +world,” he said sulkily.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +you’ll find your place all right,” said Sally. “And +I’ll come round and bring you jelly and read to you on the days +when visitors are allowed... Oh, hullo.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +last remark was addressed to a young man who had been swinging +briskly along the sidewalk from the direction of Broadway and who +now, coming abreast of them, stopped.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Good +evening, Mr. Foster.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Good +evening. Miss Nicholas.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +don’t know my brother, do you?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t believe I do.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“He +left the underworld before you came to it,” said Sally. “You +wouldn’t think it to look at him, but he was once a prune-eater +among the proletariat, even as you and I. Mrs. Meecher looks on him +as a son.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +two men shook hands. Fillmore was not short, but Gerald Foster with +his lean, well-built figure seemed to tower over him. He was an +Englishman, a man in the middle twenties, clean-shaven, keen-eyed, +and very good to look at. Fillmore, who had recently been going in +for one of those sum-up-your-fellow-man-at-a-glance courses, the +better to fit himself for his career of greatness, was rather +impressed. It seemed to him that this Mr. Foster, like himself, was +one of those who Get There. If you are that kind yourself, you get +into the knack of recognizing the others. It is a sort of gift.</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was a few moments of desultory conversation, of the kind that usually +follows an introduction, and then Fillmore, by no means sorry to get +the chance, took advantage of the coming of this new arrival to +remove himself. He had not enjoyed his chat with Sally, and it +seemed probable that he would enjoy a continuation of it even less. +He was glad that Mr. Foster had happened along at this particular +juncture. Excusing himself briefly, he hurried off down the street.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +stood for a minute, watching him till he had disappeared round the +corner. She had a slightly regretful feeling that, now it was too +late, she would think of a whole lot more good things which it would +have been agreeable to say to him. And it had become obvious to her +that Fillmore was not getting nearly enough of that kind of thing +said to him nowadays. Then she dismissed him from her mind and +turning to Gerald Foster, slipped her arm through his.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +Jerry, darling,” she said. “What a shame you couldn’t +come to the party. Tell me all about everything.”</p> + +<h3 class="sect">3</h3> + +<p class="normal">It +was exactly two months since Sally had become engaged to Gerald +Foster; but so rigorously had they kept the secret that nobody at +Mrs. Meecher’s so much as suspected it. To Sally, who all her +life had hated concealing things, secrecy of any kind was +objectionable: but in this matter Gerald had shown an odd streak +almost of furtiveness in his character. An announced engagement +complicated life. People fussed about you and bothered you. People +either watched you or avoided you. Such were his arguments, and +Sally, who would have glossed over and found excuses for a +disposition on his part towards homicide or arson, put them down to +artistic sensitiveness. There is nobody so sensitive as your artist, +particularly if he be unsuccessful: and when an artist has so little +success that he cannot afford to make a home for the woman he loves, +his sensitiveness presumably becomes great indeed. Putting herself +in his place, Sally could see that a protracted engagement, known by +everybody, would be a standing advertisement of Gerald’s +failure to make good: and she acquiesced in the policy of secrecy, +hoping that it would not last long. It seemed absurd to think of +Gerald as an unsuccessful man. He had in him, as the recent Fillmore +had perceived, something dynamic. He was one of those men of whom +one could predict that they would succeed very suddenly and +rapidly—overnight, as it were.</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +party,” said Sally, “went off splendidly.” They had +passed the boarding-house door, and were walking slowly down the +street. “Everybody enjoyed themselves, I think, even though +Fillmore did his best to spoil things by coming looking like an +advertisement of What The Smart Men Will Wear This Season. You +didn’t see his waistcoat just now. He had covered it up. +Conscience, I suppose. It was white and bulgy and gleaming and full +up of pearl buttons and everything. I saw Augustus Bartlett curl up +like a burnt feather when he caught sight of it. Still, time seemed +to heal the wound, and everybody relaxed after a bit. Mr. Faucitt +made a speech and I made a speech and cried, and …oh, it was +all very festive. It only needed you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +wish I could have come. I had to go to that dinner, though. +Sally...” Gerald paused, and Sally saw that he was electric +with suppressed excitement. “Sally, the play’s going to +be put on!”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +gave a little gasp. She had lived this moment in anticipation for +weeks. She had always known that sooner or later this would happen. +She had read his plays over and over again, and was convinced that +they were wonderful. Of course, hers was a biased view, but then +Elsa Doland also admired them; and Elsa’s opinion was one that +carried weight. Elsa was another of those people who were bound to +succeed suddenly. Even old Mr. Faucitt, who was a stern judge of +acting and rather inclined to consider that nowadays there was no +such thing, believed that she was a girl with a future who would do +something big directly she got her chance.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Jerry!” +She gave his arm a hug. “How simply terrific! Then Goble and +Kohn have changed their minds after all and want it? I knew they +would.”</p> + +<p class="normal">A +slight cloud seemed to dim the sunniness of the author’s mood.</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +not that one,” he said reluctantly. “No hope there, I’m +afraid. I saw Goble this morning about that, and he said it didn’t +add up right. The one that’s going to be put on is ‘The +Primrose Way.’ You remember? It’s got a big part for a +girl in it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Of +course! The one Elsa liked so much. Well, that’s just as good. + Who’s going to do it? I thought you hadn’t sent it out +again.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +it happens...” Gerald hesitated once more. “It seems +that this man I was dining with to-night—a man named +Cracknell...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Cracknell? +Not <i>the</i> Cracknell?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +Cracknell?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +one people are always talking about. The man they call the +Millionaire Kid.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes. +Why, do you know him?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“He +was at Harvard with Fillmore. I never saw him, but he must be rather +a painful person.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +he’s all right. Not much brains, of course, but—well, +he’s all right. And, anyway, he wants to put the play on.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +that’s splendid,” said Sally: but she could not get the +right ring of enthusiasm into her voice. She had had ideals for +Gerald. She had dreamed of him invading Broadway triumphantly under +the banner of one of the big managers whose name carried a prestige, +and there seemed something unworthy in this association with a man +whose chief claim to eminence lay in the fact that he was credited by +metropolitan gossip with possessing the largest private stock of +alcohol in existence.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +thought you would be pleased,” said Gerald.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +I am,” said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">With +the buoyant optimism which never deserted her for long, she had +already begun to cast off her momentary depression. After all, did +it matter who financed a play so long as it obtained a production? A +manager was simply a piece of machinery for paying the bills; and if +he had money for that purpose, why demand asceticism and the finer +sensibilities from him? The real thing that mattered was the question +of who was going to play the leading part, that deftly drawn +character which had so excited the admiration of Elsa Doland. She +sought information on this point.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Who +will play Ruth?” she asked. “You must have somebody +wonderful. It needs a tremendously clever woman. Did Mr. Cracknell +say anything about that?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +yes, we discussed that, of course.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +it seems...” Again Sally noticed that odd, almost stealthy +embarrassment. Gerald appeared unable to begin a sentence to-night +without feeling his way into it like a man creeping cautiously down a +dark alley. She noticed it the more because it was so different from +his usual direct method. Gerald, as a rule, was not one of those who +apologize for themselves. He was forthright and masterful and +inclined to talk to her from a height. To-night he seemed different.</p> + +<p class="normal">He +broke off, was silent for a moment, and began again with a question.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do +you know Mabel Hobson?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Mabel +Hobson? I’ve seen her in the ‘Follies,’ of course.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +started. A suspicion had stung her, so monstrous that its absurdity +became manifest the moment it had formed. And yet was it absurd? +Most Broadway gossip filtered eventually into the boarding-house, +chiefly through the medium of that seasoned sport, the mild young man +who thought so highly of the redoubtable Benny Whistler, and she was +aware that the name of Reginald Cracknell, which was always getting +itself linked with somebody, had been coupled with that of Miss +Hobson. It seemed likely that in this instance rumour spoke truth, +for the lady was of that compellingly blonde beauty which attracts +the Cracknells of this world. But even so... +</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +seems that Cracknell...” said Gerald.” Apparently this +man Cracknell...” He was finding Sally’s bright, +horrified gaze somewhat trying. “Well, the fact is Cracknell +believes in Mabel Hobson…and... well, he thinks this part +would suit her.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +Jerry!”</p> + +<p class="normal">Could +infatuation go to such a length? Could even the spacious heart of a +Reginald Cracknell so dominate that gentleman’s small size in +heads as to make him entrust a part like Ruth in “The Primrose +Way” to one who, when desired by the producer of her last revue +to carry a bowl of roses across the stage and place it on a table, +had rebelled on the plea that she had not been engaged as a dancer? +Surely even lovelorn Reginald could perceive that this was not the +stuff of which great emotional actresses are made.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +Jerry!” she said again.</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was an uncomfortable silence. They turned and walked back in the +direction of the boarding-house. Somehow Gerald’s arm had +managed to get itself detached from Sally’s. She was conscious +of a curious dull ache that was almost like a physical pain.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Jerry! +Is it worth it?” she burst out vehemently.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +question seemed to sting the young man into something like his usual +decisive speech.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Worth +it? Of course it’s worth it. It’s a Broadway production. + That’s all that matters. Good heavens! I’ve been trying +long enough to get a play on Broadway, and it isn’t likely that +I’m going to chuck away my chance when it comes along just +because one might do better in the way of casting.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But, +Jerry! Mabel Hobson! It’s... it’s murder! Murder in the +first degree.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Nonsense. + She’ll be all right. The part will play itself. Besides, she +has a personality and a following, and Cracknell will spend all the +money in the world to make the thing a success. And it will be a +start, whatever happens. Of course, it’s worth it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +would have been impressed by this speech. He would have recognized +and respected in it the unmistakable ring which characterizes even +the lightest utterances of those who get there. On Sally it had not +immediately that effect. Nevertheless, her habit of making the best +of things, working together with that primary article of her creed +that the man she loved could do no wrong, succeeded finally in +raising her spirits. Of course Jerry was right. It would have been +foolish to refuse a contract because all its clauses were not ideal.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +old darling,” she said affectionately attaching herself to the +vacant arm once more and giving it a penitent squeeze, “you’re +quite right. Of course you are. I can see it now. I was only a +little startled at first. Everything’s going to be wonderful. +Let’s get all our chickens out and count ‘em. How are +you going to spend the money?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +know how I’m going to spend a dollar of it,” said Gerald +completely restored.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +mean the big money. What’s a dollar?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +pays for a marriage-licence.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +gave his arm another squeeze.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ladies +and gentlemen,” she said. “Look at this man. Observe +him. <i>My</i> partner!”</p> + + +<h3 class="chap">CHAPTER II</h3> + +<h3 class="titl">ENTER GINGER</h3> + +<h3 class="sect">1</h3> + + +<p class="normal">Sally +was sitting with her back against a hillock of golden sand, watching +with half-closed eyes the denizens of Roville-sur-Mer at their +familiar morning occupations. At Roville, as at most French seashore +resorts, the morning is the time when the visiting population +assembles in force on the beach. Whiskered fathers of families made +cheerful patches of colour in the foreground. Their female friends +and relatives clustered in groups under gay parasols. Dogs roamed to +and fro, and children dug industriously with spades, ever and anon +suspending their labours in order to smite one another with these +handy implements. One of the dogs, a poodle of military aspect, +wandered up to Sally: and discovering that she was in possession of a +box of sweets, decided to remain and await developments.</p> + +<p class="normal">Few +things are so pleasant as the anticipation of them, but Sally’s +vacation had proved an exception to this rule. It had been a magic +month of lazy happiness. She had drifted luxuriously from one French +town to another, till the charm of Roville, with its blue sky, its +Casino, its snow-white hotels along the Promenade, and its general +glitter and gaiety, had brought her to a halt. Here she could have +stayed indefinitely, but the voice of America was calling her back. +Gerald had written to say that “The Primrose Way” was to +be produced in Detroit, preliminary to its New York run, so soon +that, if she wished to see the opening, she must return at once. A +scrappy, hurried, unsatisfactory letter, the letter of a busy man: +but one that Sally could not ignore. She was leaving Roville +to-morrow.</p> + +<p class="normal">To-day, +however, was to-day: and she sat and watched the bathers with a +familiar feeling of peace, revelling as usual in the still novel +sensation of having nothing to do but bask in the warm sunshine and +listen to the faint murmur of the little waves.</p> + +<p class="normal">But, +if there was one drawback, she had discovered, to a morning on the +Roville <i>plage,</i> it was that you had a tendency to fall asleep: +and this is a degrading thing to do so soon after breakfast, even if +you are on a holiday. Usually, Sally fought stoutly against the +temptation, but to-day the sun was so warm and the whisper of the +waves so insinuating that she had almost dozed off, when she was +aroused by voices close at hand. There were many voices on the +beach, both near and distant, but these were talking English, a +novelty in Roville, and the sound of the familiar tongue jerked Sally +back from the borders of sleep. A few feet away, two men had seated +themselves on the sand.</p> + +<p class="normal">From +the first moment she had set out on her travels, it had been one of +Sally’s principal amusements to examine the strangers whom +chance threw in her way and to try by the light of her intuition to +fit them out with characters and occupations: nor had she been +discouraged by an almost consistent failure to guess right. Out of +the corner of her eye she inspected these two men.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +first of the pair did not attract her. He was a tall, dark man whose +tight, precise mouth and rather high cheeks bones gave him an +appearance vaguely sinister. He had the dusky look of the +clean-shaven man whose life is a perpetual struggle with a determined +beard. He certainly shaved twice a day, and just as certainly had +the self-control not to swear when he cut himself. She could picture +him smiling nastily when this happened.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Hard,” +diagnosed Sally. “I shouldn’t like him. A lawyer or +something, I think.”</p> + +<p class="normal">She +turned to the other and found herself looking into his eyes. This +was because he had been staring at Sally with the utmost intentness +ever since his arrival. His mouth had opened slightly. He had the +air of a man who, after many disappointments, has at last found +something worth looking at.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Rather +a dear,” decided Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">He +was a sturdy, thick-set young man with an amiable, freckled face and +the reddest hair Sally had ever seen. He had a square chin, and at +one angle of the chin a slight cut. And Sally was convinced that, +however he had behaved on receipt of that wound, it had not been with +superior self-control.</p> + +<p class="normal">“A +temper, I should think,” she meditated. “Very quick, but +soon over. Not very clever, I should say, but nice.”</p> + +<p class="normal">She +looked away, finding his fascinated gaze a little embarrassing.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +dark man, who in the objectionably competent fashion which, one felt, +characterized all his actions, had just succeeded in lighting a +cigarette in the teeth of a strong breeze, threw away the match and +resumed the conversation, which had presumably been interrupted by +the process of sitting down.</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +how <i>is</i> Scrymgeour?” he inquired.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +all right,” replied the young man with red hair absently. +Sally was looking straight in front of her, but she felt that his +eyes were still busy.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +was surprised at his being here. He told me he meant to stay in +Paris.”</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was a slight pause. Sally gave the attentive poodle a piece of +nougat.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +say,” observed the red-haired young man in clear, penetrating +tones that vibrated with intense feeling, “that’s the +prettiest girl I’ve seen in my life!”</p> + +<h3 class="sect">2</h3> + +<p class="normal">At +this frank revelation of the red-haired young man’s personal +opinions, Sally, though considerably startled, was not displeased. A +broad-minded girl, the outburst seemed to her a legitimate comment on +a matter of public interest. The young man’s companion, on the +other hand, was unmixedly shocked.</p> + +<p class="normal">“My +dear fellow!” he ejaculated.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +it’s all right,” said the red-haired young man, unmoved. +“She can’t understand. There isn’t a bally soul in +this dashed place that can speak a word of English. If I didn’t +happen to remember a few odd bits of French, I should have starved by +this time. That girl,” he went on, returning to the subject +most imperatively occupying his mind, “is an absolute topper! I +give you my solemn word I’ve never seen anybody to touch her. +Look at those hands and feet. You don’t get them outside +France. Of course, her mouth is a bit wide,” he said +reluctantly.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally’s +immobility, added to the other’s assurance concerning the +linguistic deficiencies of the inhabitants of Roville, seemed to +reassure the dark man. He breathed again. At no period of his life +had he ever behaved with anything but the most scrupulous correctness +himself, but he had quailed at the idea of being associated even +remotely with incorrectness in another. It had been a black moment +for him when the red-haired young man had uttered those few kind +words.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Still +you ought to be careful,” he said austerely.</p> + +<p class="normal">He +looked at Sally, who was now dividing her attention between the +poodle and a raffish-looking mongrel, who had joined the party, and +returned to the topic of the mysterious Scrymgeour.</p> + +<p class="normal">“How +is Scrymgeour’s dyspepsia?”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +red-haired young man seemed but faintly interested in the +vicissitudes of Scrymgeour’s interior.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do +you notice the way her hair sort of curls over her ears?” he +said. “Eh? Oh, pretty much the same, I think.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +hotel are you staying at?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +Normandie.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally, +dipping into the box for another chocolate cream, gave an +imperceptible start. She, too, was staying at the Normandie. She +presumed that her admirer was a recent arrival, for she had seen +nothing of him at the hotel.</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +Normandie?” The dark man looked puzzled. “I know Roville +pretty well by report, but I’ve never heard of any Hotel +Normandie. Where is it?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +a little shanty down near the station. Not much of a place. Still, +it’s cheap, and the cooking’s all right.”</p> + +<p class="normal">His +companion’s bewilderment increased.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +on earth is a man like Scrymgeour doing there?” he said. Sally +was conscious of an urgent desire to know more and more about the +absent Scrymgeour. Constant repetition of his name had made him seem +almost like an old friend. “If there’s one thing he’s +fussy about...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“There +are at least eleven thousand things he’s fussy about,” +interrupted the red-haired young man disapprovingly. “Jumpy +old blighter!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +there’s one thing he’s particular about, it’s the +sort of hotel he goes to. Ever since I’ve known him he has +always wanted the best. I should have thought he would have gone to +the Splendide.” He mused on this problem in a dissatisfied sort +of way for a moment, then seemed to reconcile himself to the fact +that a rich man’s eccentricities must be humoured. “I’d +like to see him again. Ask him if he will dine with me at the +Splendide to-night. Say eight sharp.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally, +occupied with her dogs, whose numbers had now been augmented by a +white terrier with a black patch over its left eye, could not see the +young man’s face: but his voice, when he replied, told her that +something was wrong. There was a false airiness in it.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +Scrymgeour isn’t in Roville.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No? +Where is he?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Paris, +I believe.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What!” +The dark man’s voice sharpened. He sounded as though he were +cross-examining a reluctant witness. “Then why aren’t +you there? What are you doing here? Did he give you a holiday?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +he did.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“When +do you rejoin him?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What!”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +red-haired young man’s manner was not unmistakably dogged.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +if you want to know,” he said, “the old blighter fired me +the day before yesterday.”</p> + +<h3 class="sect">3</h3> + +<p class="normal">There +was a shuffling of sand as the dark man sprang up. Sally, intent on +the drama which was unfolding itself beside her, absent-mindedly gave +the poodle a piece of nougat which should by rights have gone to the +terrier. She shot a swift glance sideways, and saw the dark man +standing in an attitude rather reminiscent of the stern father of +melodrama about to drive his erring daughter out into the snow. The +red-haired young man, outwardly stolid, was gazing before him down +the beach at a fat bather in an orange suit who, after six false +starts, was now actually in the water, floating with the dignity of a +wrecked balloon.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do +you mean to tell me,” demanded the dark man, “that, after +all the trouble the family took to get you what was practically a +sinecure with endless possibilities if you only behaved yourself, you +have deliberately thrown away...” A despairing gesture +completed the sentence. “Good God, you’re hopeless!”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +red-haired young man made no reply. He continued to gaze down the +beach. Of all outdoor sports, few are more stimulating than watching +middle-aged Frenchmen bathe. Drama, action, suspense, all are here. +From the first stealthy testing of the water with an apprehensive toe +to the final seal-like plunge, there is never a dull moment. And +apart from the excitement of the thing, judging it from a purely +aesthetic standpoint, his must be a dull soul who can fail to be +uplifted by the spectacle of a series of very stout men with +whiskers, seen in tight bathing suits against a background of +brightest blue. Yet the young man with red hair, recently in the +employment of Mr. Scrymgeour, eyed this free circus without any +enjoyment whatever.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +maddening! What are you going to do? What do you expect us to do? Are +we to spend our whole lives getting you positions which you won’t +keep? I can tell you we’re... it’s monstrous! It’s +sickening! Good God!”</p> + +<p class="normal">And +with these words the dark man, apparently feeling, as Sally had +sometimes felt in the society of her brother Fillmore, the futility +of mere language, turned sharply and stalked away up the beach, the +dignity of his exit somewhat marred a moment later by the fact of his +straw hat blowing off and being trodden on by a passing child.</p> + +<p class="normal">He +left behind him the sort of electric calm which follows the falling +of a thunderbolt; that stunned calm through which the air seems still +to quiver protestingly. How long this would have lasted one cannot +say: for towards the end of the first minute it was shattered by a +purely terrestrial uproar. With an abruptness heralded only by one +short, low gurgling snarl, there sprang into being the prettiest dog +fight that Roville had seen that season.</p> + +<p class="normal">It +was the terrier with the black patch who began it. That was Sally’s +opinion: and such, one feels, will be the verdict of history. His +best friend, anxious to make out a case for him, could not have +denied that he fired the first gun of the campaign. But we must be +just. The fault was really Sally’s. Absorbed in the scene +which had just concluded and acutely inquisitive as to why the +shadowy Scrymgeour had seen fit to dispense with the red-haired young +man’s services, she had thrice in succession helped the poodle +out of his turn. The third occasion was too much for the terrier.</p> + +<p class="normal">There +is about any dog fight a wild, gusty fury which affects the average +mortal with something of the helplessness induced by some vast +clashing of the elements. It seems so outside one’s +jurisdiction. One is oppressed with a sense of the futility of +interference. And this was no ordinary dog fight. It was a stunning +mêlée, which would have excited favourable comment even +among the blasé residents of a negro quarter or the not +easily-pleased critics of a Lancashire mining-village. From all over +the beach dogs of every size, breed, and colour were racing to the +scene: and while some of these merely remained in the ringside seats +and barked, a considerable proportion immediately started fighting +one another on general principles, well content to be in action +without bothering about first causes. The terrier had got the poodle +by the left hind-leg and was restating his war-aims. The raffish +mongrel was apparently endeavouring to fletcherize a complete +stranger of the Sealyham family.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +was frankly unequal to the situation, as were the entire crowd of +spectators who had come galloping up from the water’s edge. +She had been paralysed from the start. Snarling bundles bumped +against her legs and bounced away again, but she made no move. +Advice in fluent French rent the air. Arms waved, and well-filled +bathing suits leaped up and down. But nobody did anything practical +until in the centre of the theatre of war there suddenly appeared the +red-haired young man.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +only reason why dog fights do not go on for ever is that Providence +has decided that on each such occasion there shall always be among +those present one Master Mind; one wizard who, whatever his +shortcomings in other battles of life, is in this single particular +sphere competent and dominating. At Roville-sur-Mer it was the +red-haired young man. His dark companion might have turned from him +in disgust: his services might not have seemed worth retaining by the +haughty Scrymgeour: he might be a pain in the neck to “the +family”; but he did know how to stop a dog fight. From the +first moment of his intervention calm began to steal over the scene. +He had the same effect on the almost inextricably entwined +belligerents as, in mediaeval legend, the Holy Grail, sliding down +the sunbeam, used to have on battling knights. He did not look like +a dove of peace, but the most captious could not have denied that he +brought home the goods. There was a magic in his soothing hands, a +spell in his voice: and in a shorter time than one would have +believed possible dog after dog had been sorted out and calmed down; +until presently all that was left of Armageddon was one solitary +small Scotch terrier, thoughtfully licking a chewed leg. The rest of +the combatants, once more in their right mind and wondering what all +the fuss was about, had been captured and haled away in a whirl of +recrimination by voluble owners.</p> + +<p class="normal">Having +achieved this miracle, the young man turned to Sally. Gallant, one +might say reckless, as he had been a moment before, he now gave +indications of a rather pleasing shyness. He braced himself with +that painful air of effort which announces to the world that an +Englishman is about to speak a language other than his own.</p> + +<p class="normal">“<i>J’espère,”</i> +he said, having swallowed once or twice to brace himself up for the +journey through the jungle of a foreign tongue, <i>“ J’espère +que vous n’êtes pas—</i>oh, dammit, what’s +the word—<i>- J’espère que vous n’êtes +pas blessée?”</i></p> + +<p class="normal">“<i>Blessée?”</i></p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +<i>blessée. </i>Wounded. Hurt, don’t you know. +Bitten. Oh, dash it. <i>J’espère...”</i></p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +bitten!” said Sally, dimpling. “Oh, no, thanks very +much. I wasn’t bitten. And I think it was awfully brave of +you to save all our lives.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +compliment seemed to pass over the young man’s head. He stared +at Sally with horrified eyes. Over his amiable face there swept a +vivid blush. His jaw dropped.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +my sainted aunt!” he ejaculated.</p> + +<p class="normal">Then, +as if the situation was too much for him and flights the only +possible solution, he spun round and disappeared at a walk so rapid +that it was almost a run. Sally watched him go and was sorry that he +had torn himself away. She still wanted to know why Scrymgeour had +fired him.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">4</h3> + +<p class="normal">Bedtime +at Roville is an hour that seems to vary according to one’s +proximity to the sea. The gilded palaces along the front keep +deplorable hours, polluting the night air till dawn with +indefatigable jazz: but at the <i>pensions</i> of the economical like +the Normandie, early to bed is the rule. True, Jules, the stout +young native who combined the offices of night-clerk and lift +attendant at that establishment, was on duty in the hall throughout +the night, but few of the Normandie’s patrons made use of his +services.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally, +entering shortly before twelve o’clock on the night of the day +on which the dark man, the red-haired young man, and their friend +Scrymgeour had come into her life, found the little hall dim and +silent. Through the iron cage of the lift a single faint bulb +glowed: another, over the desk in the far corner, illuminated the +upper half of Jules, slumbering in a chair. Jules seemed to Sally to +be on duty in some capacity or other all the time. His work, like +women’s, was never done. He was now restoring his tissues with +a few winks of much-needed beauty sleep. Sally, who had been to the +Casino to hear the band and afterwards had strolled on the moonlit +promenade, had a guilty sense of intrusion.</p> + +<p class="normal">As +she stood there, reluctant to break in on Jules’ rest— +for her sympathetic heart, always at the disposal of the oppressed, +had long ached for this overworked peon—she was relieved to +hear footsteps in the street outside, followed by the opening of the +front door. If Jules would have had to wake up anyway, she felt her +sense of responsibility lessened. The door, having opened, closed +again with a bang. Jules stirred, gurgled, blinked, and sat up, and +Sally, turning, perceived that the new arrival was the red-haired +young man.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +good evening,” said Sally welcomingly.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +young man stopped, and shuffled uncomfortably. The morning’s +happenings were obviously still green in his memory. He had either +not ceased blushing since their last meeting or he was celebrating +their reunion by beginning to blush again: for his face was a +familiar scarlet.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Er—good +evening,” he said, disentangling his feet, which, in the +embarrassment of the moment, had somehow got coiled up together.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Or +<i>bon soir,</i> I suppose <i>you</i> would say,” murmured +Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +young man acknowledged receipt of this thrust by dropping his hat and +tripping over it as he stooped to pick it up.</p> + +<p class="normal">Jules, +meanwhile, who had been navigating in a sort of somnambulistic trance +in the neighbourhood of the lift, now threw back the cage with a +rattle.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +a shame to have woken you up,” said Sally, commiseratingly, +stepping in.</p> + +<p class="normal">Jules +did not reply, for the excellent reason that he had not been woken +up. Constant practice enabled him to do this sort of work without +breaking his slumber. His brain, if you could call it that, was +working automatically. He had shut up the gate with a clang and was +tugging sluggishly at the correct rope, so that the lift was going +slowly up instead of retiring down into the basement, but he was not +awake.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +and the red-haired young man sat side by side on the small seat, +watching their conductor’s efforts. After the first spurt, +conversation had languished. Sally had nothing of immediate interest +to say, and her companion seemed to be one of these strong, silent +men you read about. Only a slight snore from Jules broke the +silence.</p> + +<p class="normal">At +the third floor Sally leaned forward and prodded Jules in the lower +ribs. All through her stay at Roville, she had found in dealing with +the native population that actions spoke louder than words. If she +wanted anything in a restaurant or at a shop, she pointed; and, when +she wished the lift to stop, she prodded the man in charge. It was a +system worth a dozen French conversation books.</p> + +<p class="normal">Jules +brought the machine to a halt: and it was at this point that he +should have done the one thing connected with his professional +activities which he did really well—the opening, to wit, of the +iron cage. There are ways of doing this. Jules’ was the right +way. He was accustomed to do it with a flourish, and generally +remarked “V’la!” in a modest but +self-congratulatory voice as though he would have liked to see +another man who could have put through a job like that. Jules’ +opinion was that he might not be much to look at, but that he could +open a lift door.</p> + +<p class="normal">To-night, +however, it seemed as if even this not very exacting feat was beyond +his powers. Instead of inserting his key in the lock, he stood +staring in an attitude of frozen horror. He was a man who took most +things in life pretty seriously, and whatever was the little +difficulty just now seemed to have broken him all up.</p> + +<p class="normal">“There +appears,” said Sally, turning to her companion, “to be a +hitch. Would you mind asking what’s the matter? I don’t +know any French myself except ‘oo la la!’ “</p> + +<p class="normal">The +young man, thus appealed to, nerved himself to the task. He eyed the +melancholy Jules doubtfully, and coughed in a strangled sort of way.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +<i>esker... esker vous...”</i></p> + +<p class="normal">“Don’t +weaken,” said Sally. “I think you’ve got him +going.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“<i>Esker +vous... Pourquoi vous ne</i>... I mean <i>ne vous... </i>that is to +say, <i>quel est le raison</i>...”</p> + +<p class="normal">He +broke off here, because at this point Jules began to explain. He +explained very rapidly and at considerable length. The fact that +neither of his hearers understood a word of what he was saying +appeared not to have impressed itself upon him. Or, if he gave a +thought to it, he dismissed the objection as trifling. He wanted to +explain, and he explained. Words rushed from him like water from a +geyser. Sounds which you felt you would have been able to put a +meaning to if he had detached them from the main body and repeated +them slowly, went swirling down the stream and were lost for ever.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Stop +him!” said Sally firmly.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +red-haired young man looked as a native of Johnstown might have +looked on being requested to stop that city’s celebrated flood.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Stop +him?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes. + Blow a whistle or something.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Out +of the depths of the young man’s memory there swam to the +surface a single word—a word which he must have heard somewhere +or read somewhere: a legacy, perhaps, from long-vanished school-days.</p> + +<p class="normal">“<i>Zut!”</i> +he barked, and instantaneously Jules turned himself off at the main. +There was a moment of dazed silence, such as might occur in a +boiler-factory if the works suddenly shut down.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Quick! +Now you’ve got him!” cried Sally. “Ask him what +he’s talking about—if he knows, which I doubt—and +tell him to speak slowly. Then we shall get somewhere.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +young man nodded intelligently. The advice was good.</p> + +<p class="normal">“<i>Lentement,”</i> +he said. <i>“Parlez lentement. Pas si—</i>you know what +I mean—<i>pas si</i> dashed <i>vite!”</i></p> + +<p class="normal">“Ah-a-ah!” +cried Jules, catching the idea on the fly. <i>“Lentement. Ah, +oui, lentement.”</i></p> + +<p class="normal">There +followed a lengthy conversation which, while conveying nothing to +Sally, seemed intelligible to the red-haired linguist.</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +silly ass,” he was able to announce some few minutes later, +“has made a bloomer. Apparently he was half asleep when we +came in, and he shoved us into the lift and slammed the door, +forgetting that he had left the keys on the desk.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +see,” said Sally. “So we’re shut in?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +afraid so. I wish to goodness,” said the young man, “I +knew French well. I’d curse him with some vim and not a little +animation, the chump! I wonder what ‘blighter’ is in +French,” he said, meditating.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +the merest suggestion,” said Sally, “but oughtn’t +we to <i>do </i>something?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +could we do?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +for one thing, we might all utter a loud yell. It would scare most +of the people in the hotel to death, but there might be a survivor or +two who would come and investigate and let us out.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +a ripping idea!” said the young man, impressed.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +glad you like it. Now tell him the main out-line, or he’ll +think we’ve gone mad.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +young man searched for words, and eventually found some which +expressed his meaning lamely but well enough to cause Jules to nod in +a depressed sort of way.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Fine!” +said Sally. “Now, all together at the word ‘three.’ +One—two—Oh, poor darling!” she broke off. “Look +at him!”</p> + +<p class="normal">In +the far corner of the lift, the emotional Jules was sobbing silently +into the bunch of cotton-waste which served him in the office of a +pocket-handkerchief. His broken-hearted gulps echoed hollowly down +the shaft.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">5</h3> + +<p class="normal">In +these days of cheap books of instruction on every subject under the +sun, we most of us know how to behave in the majority of life’s +little crises. We have only ourselves to blame if we are ignorant of +what to do before the doctor comes, of how to make a dainty winter +coat for baby out of father’s last year’s under-vest and +of the best method of coping with the cold mutton. But nobody yet +has come forward with practical advice as to the correct method of +behaviour to be adopted when a lift-attendant starts crying. And +Sally and her companion, as a consequence, for a few moments merely +stared at each other helplessly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Poor +darling!” said Sally, finding speech. “Ask him what’s +the matter.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +young man looked at her doubtfully.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +know,” he said, “I don’t enjoy chatting with this +blighter. I mean to say, it’s a bit of an effort. I don’t +know why it is, but talking French always makes me feel as if my nose +were coming off. Couldn’t we just leave him to have his cry +out by himself?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +idea!” said Sally. “Have you no heart? Are you one of +those fiends in human shape?”</p> + +<p class="normal">He +turned reluctantly to Jules, and paused to overhaul his vocabulary.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +ought to be thankful for this chance,” said Sally. “It’s +the only real way of learning French, and you’re getting a +lesson for nothing. What did he say then?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Something +about losing something, it seemed to me. I thought I caught the word +<i>perdu.”</i></p> + +<p class="normal">“But +that means a partridge, doesn’t it? I’m sure I’ve +seen it on the menus.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Would +he talk about partridges at a time like this?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“He +might. The French are extraordinary people.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +I’ll have another go at him. But he’s a difficult chap +to chat with. If you give him the least encouragement, he sort of +goes off like a rocket.” He addressed another question to the +sufferer, and listened attentively to the voluble reply.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh!” +he said with sudden enlightenment. “Your<i> job?</i>” +He turned to Sally. “I got it that time,” he said. +“The trouble is, he says, that if we yell and rouse the house, +we’ll get out all right, but he will lose his job, because this +is the second time this sort of thing has happened, and they warned +him last time that once more would mean the push.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Then +we mustn’t dream of yelling,” said Sally, decidedly. “It +means a pretty long wait, you know. As far as I can gather, there’s +just a chance of somebody else coming in later, in which case he +could let us out. But it’s doubtful. He rather thinks that +everybody has gone to roost.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +we must try it. I wouldn’t think of losing the poor man his +job. Tell him to take the car down to the ground-floor, and then +we’ll just sit and amuse ourselves till something happens. +We’ve lots to talk about. We can tell each other the story of +our lives.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Jules, +cheered by his victims’ kindly forbearance, lowered the car to +the ground floor, where, after a glance of infinite longing at the +keys on the distant desk, the sort of glance which Moses must have +cast at the Promised Land from the summit of Mount Pisgah, he sagged +down in a heap and resumed his slumbers. Sally settled herself as +comfortably as possible in her corner.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’d +better smoke,” she said. “It will be something to do.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Thanks +awfully.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +now,” said Sally, “tell me why Scrymgeour fired you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Little +by little, under the stimulating influence of this nocturnal +adventure, the red-haired young man had lost that shy confusion which +had rendered him so ill at ease when he had encountered Sally in the +hall of the hotel; but at this question embarrassment gripped him +once more. Another of those comprehensive blushes of his raced over +his face, and he stammered.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +say, I’m glad... I’m fearfully sorry about that, you +know!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“About +Scrymgeour?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +know what I mean. I mean, about making such a most ghastly ass of +myself this morning. I... I never dreamed you understood English.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why, +I didn’t object. I thought you were very nice and +complimentary. Of course, I don’t know how many girls you’ve +seen in your life, but...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +I say, don’t! It makes me feel such a chump.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +I’m sorry about my mouth. It <i>is</i> wide. But I know +you’re a fair-minded man and realize that it isn’t my +fault.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Don’t +rub it in,” pleaded the young man. “As a matter of fact, +if you want to know, I think your mouth is absolutely perfect. I +think,” he proceeded, a little feverishly, “that you are +the most indescribable topper that ever...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +were going to tell me about Scrymgeour,” said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +young man blinked as if he had collided with some hard object while +sleep-walking. Eloquence had carried him away.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Scrymgeour?” +he said. “Oh, that would bore you.” +</p> + +<p class="normal">“Don’t +be silly,” said Sally reprovingly. “Can’t you +realize that we’re practically castaways on a desert island? +There’s nothing to do till to-morrow but talk about ourselves. +I want to hear all about you, and then I’ll tell you all about +myself. If you feel diffident about starting the revelations, I’ll +begin. Better start with names. Mine is Sally Nicholas. What’s +yours?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Mine? +Oh, ah, yes, I see what you mean.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +thought you would. I put it as clearly as I could. Well, what is +it?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Kemp.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +the first name?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +as a matter of fact,” said the young man, “I’ve +always rather hushed up my first name, because when I was christened +they worked a low-down trick on me!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +can’t shock <i>me,”</i> said Sally, encouragingly. “My +father’s name was Ezekiel, and I’ve a brother who was +christened Fillmore.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Kemp brightened. “Well, mine isn’t as bad as that... No, +I don’t mean that,” he broke off apologetically. “Both +awfully jolly names, of course...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Get +on,” said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +they called me Lancelot. And, of course, the thing is that I don’t +look like a Lancelot and never shall. My pals,” he added in a +more cheerful strain, “call me Ginger.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t blame them,” said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Perhaps +you wouldn’t mind thinking of me as Ginger?’’ +suggested the young man diffidently.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Certainly.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“That’s +awfully good of you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Not +at all.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Jules +stirred in his sleep and grunted. No other sound came to disturb the +stillness of the night.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +were going to tell me about yourself?” said Mr. Lancelot +(Ginger) Kemp.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +going to tell you <i>all</i> about myself,” said Sally, “not +because I think it will interest you...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +it will!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Not, +I say, because I think it will interest you...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +will, really.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +looked at him coldly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Is +this a duet?” she inquired, “or have I the floor?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +awfully sorry.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Not, +I repeat for the third time, because I think It will interest you, +but because if I do you won’t have any excuse for not telling +me your life-history, and you wouldn’t believe how inquisitive +I am. Well, in the first place, I live in America. I’m over +here on a holiday. And it’s the first real holiday I’ve +had in three years—since I left home, in fact.” Sally +paused. “I ran away from home,” she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Good +egg!” said Ginger Kemp.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +beg your pardon?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +mean, quite right. I bet you were quite right.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“When +I say home,” Sally went on, “it was only a sort of +imitation home, you know. One of those just-as-good homes which are +never as satisfactory as the real kind. My father and mother both +died a good many years ago. My brother and I were dumped down on the +reluctant doorstep of an uncle.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Uncles,” +said Ginger Kemp, feelingly, “are the devil. I’ve got +an... but I’m interrupting you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“My +uncle was our trustee. He had control of all my brother’s +money and mine till I was twenty-one. My brother was to get his when +he was twenty-five. My poor father trusted him blindly, and what do +you think happened?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Good +Lord! The blighter embezzled the lot?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +not a cent. Wasn’t it extraordinary! Have you ever heard of a +blindly trusted uncle who was perfectly honest? Well, mine was. But +the trouble was that, while an excellent man to have looking after +one’s money, he wasn’t a very lovable character. He was +very hard. Hard! He was as hard as—well, nearly as hard as +this seat. He hated poor Fill...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Phil?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +broke it to you just now that my brother’s name was Fillmore.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +your brother. Oh, ah, yes.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“He +was always picking on poor Fill. And I’m bound to say that +Fill rather laid himself out as what you might call a pickee. He was +always getting into trouble. One day, about three years ago, he was +expelled from Harvard, and my uncle vowed he would have nothing more +to do with him. So I said, if Fill left, I would leave. And, as +this seemed to be my uncle’s idea of a large evening, no +objection was raised, and Fill and I departed. We went to New York, +and there we’ve been ever since. About six months’ ago +Fill passed the twenty-five mark and collected his money, and last +month I marched past the given point and got mine. So it all ends +happily, you see. Now tell me about yourself.” +</p> + +<p class="normal">“But, +I say, you know, dash it, you’ve skipped a lot. I mean to say, +you must have had an awful time in New York, didn’t you? How on +earth did you get along?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +we found work. My brother tried one or two things, and finally +became an assistant stage-manager with some theatre people. The only +thing I could do, having been raised in enervating luxury, was +ballroom dancing, so I ball-room danced. I got a job at a place in +Broadway called ‘The Flower Garden’ as what is humorously +called an ‘instructress,’ as if anybody could ‘instruct’ +the men who came there. One was lucky if one saved one’s life +and wasn’t quashed to death.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“How +perfectly foul!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +I don’t know. It was rather fun for a while. Still,” +said Sally, meditatively, “I’m not saying I could have +held out much longer: I was beginning to give. I suppose I’ve +been trampled underfoot by more fat men than any other girl of my age +in America. I don’t know why it was, but every man who came in +who was a bit overweight seemed to make for me by instinct. That’s +why I like to sit on the sands here and watch these Frenchmen +bathing. It’s just heavenly to lie back and watch a two +hundred and fifty pound man, coming along and feel that he isn’t +going to dance with me.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But, +I say! How absolutely rotten it must have been for you!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +I’ll tell you one thing. It’s going to make me a very +domesticated wife one of these days. You won’t find <i>me +</i>gadding about in gilded jazz-palaces! For me, a little place in +the country somewhere, with my knitting and an Elsie book, and bed at +half-past nine! And now tell me the story of your life. And make it +long because I’m perfectly certain there’s going to be no +relief-expedition. I’m sure the last dweller under this roof +came in years ago. We shall be here till morning.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +really think we had better shout, you know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +lose Jules his job? Never!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +of course, I’m sorry for poor old Jules’ troubles, but I +hate to think of you having to…”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Now +get on with the story,” said Sally.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">6</h3> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +Kemp exhibited some of the symptoms of a young bridegroom called upon +at a wedding-breakfast to respond to the toast. He moved his feet +restlessly and twisted his fingers.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +hate talking about myself, you know,” he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">“So +I supposed,” said Sally. “That’s why I gave you my +autobiography first, to give you no chance of backing out. Don’t +be such a shrinking violet. We’re all shipwrecked mariners +here. I am intensely interested in your narrative. And, even if I +wasn’t, I’d much rather listen to it than to Jules’ +snoring.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“He +<i>is</i> snoring a bit, what? Does it annoy you? Shall I stir him?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +seem to have an extraordinary brutal streak in your nature,” +said Sally. “You appear to think of nothing else but schemes +for harassing poor Jules. Leave him alone for a second, and start +telling me about yourself.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Where +shall I start?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +not with your childhood, I think. We’ll skip that.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well...” +Ginger Kemp knitted his brow, searching for a dramatic opening. +“Well, I’m more or less what you might call an orphan, +like you. I mean to say, both my people are dead and all that sort +of thing.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Thanks +for explaining. That has made it quite clear.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +can’t remember my mother. My father died when I was in my last +year at Cambridge. I’d been having a most awfully good time at +the ‘varsity,’ ” said Ginger, warming to his theme. + “Not thick, you know, but good. I’d got my rugger and +boxing blues and I’d just been picked for scrum-half for +England against the North in the first trial match, and between +ourselves it really did look as if I was more or less of a snip for +my international.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +gazed at him wide eyed.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Is +that good or bad?” she asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Eh?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Are +you reciting a catalogue of your crimes, or do you expect me to get +up and cheer? What is a rugger blue, to start with?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +it’s... it’s a rugger blue, you know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +I see,” said Sally. “You mean a rugger blue.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +mean to say, I played rugger—footer—that’s to say, +football—Rugby football—for Cambridge, against Oxford. I +was scrum-half.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +what is a scrum-half?” asked Sally, patiently. “Yes, I +know you’re going to say it’s a scrum-half, but can’t +you make it easier?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +scrum-half,” said Ginger, “is the half who works the +scrum. He slings the pill out to the fly-half, who starts the +three-quarters going. I don’t know if you understand?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +dashed hard to explain,” said Ginger Kemp, unhappily. “I +mean, I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone before who +didn’t know what a scrum-half was.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +I can see that it has something to do with football, so we’ll +leave it at that. I suppose it’s something like our +quarter-back. And what’s an international?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +called getting your international when you play for England, you +know. England plays Wales, France, Ireland, and Scotland. If it +hadn’t been for the smash, I think I should have played for +England against Wales.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +see at last. What you’re trying to tell me is that you were +very good at football.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +Kemp blushed warmly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +I don’t say that. England was pretty short of scrum-halves +that year.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +a horrible thing to happen to a country! Still, you were likely to be +picked on the All-England team when the smash came? What was the +smash?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +it turned out that the poor old pater hadn’t left a penny. I +never understood the process exactly, but I’d always supposed +that we were pretty well off; and then it turned out that I hadn’t +anything at all. I’m bound to say it was a bit of a jar. I +had to come down from Cambridge and go to work in my uncle’s +office. Of course, I made an absolute hash of it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why, +of course?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +I’m not a very clever sort of chap, you see. I somehow didn’t +seem able to grasp the workings. After about a year, my uncle, +getting a bit fed-up, hoofed me out and got me a mastership at a +school, and I made a hash of that. He got me one or two other jobs, +and I made a hash of those.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +certainly do seem to be one of our most prominent young hashers!” +gasped Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +am,” said Ginger, modestly.</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was a silence.</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +what about Scrymgeour?” Sally asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">“That +was the last of the jobs,” said Ginger. “Scrymgeour is a +pompous old ass who think’s he’s going to be Prime +Minister some day. He’s a big bug at the Bar and has just got +into Parliament. My cousin used to devil for him. That’s how +I got mixed up with the blighter.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Your +cousin used... ? I wish you would talk English.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“That +was my cousin who was with me on the beach this morning.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +what did you say he used to do for Mr. Scrymgeour?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +it’s called devilling. My cousin’s at the Bar, too— +one of our rising nibs, as a matter of fact...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +thought he was a lawyer of some kind.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“He’s +got a long way beyond it now, but when he started he used to devil +for Scrymgeour—assist him, don’t you know. His name’s +Carmyle, you know. Perhaps you’ve heard of him? He’s +rather a prominent johnny in his way. Bruce Carmyle, you know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +haven’t.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +he got me this job of secretary to Scrymgeour.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +why did Mr. Scrymgeour fire you?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +Kemp’s face darkened. He frowned. Sally, watching him, felt +that she had been right when she had guessed that he had a temper. +She liked him none the worse for it. Mild men did not appeal to her.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t know if you’re fond of dogs?” said Ginger.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +used to be before this morning,” said Sally. “And I +suppose I shall be again in time. For the moment I’ve had what +you might call rather a surfeit of dogs. But aren’t you +straying from the point? I asked you why Mr. Scrymgeour dismissed +you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +telling you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +glad of that. I didn’t know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +old brute,” said Ginger, frowning again, “has a dog. A +very jolly little spaniel. Great pal of mine. And Scrymgeour is the +sort of fool who oughtn’t to be allowed to own a dog. He’s +one of those asses who isn’t fit to own a dog. As a matter of +fact, of all the blighted, pompous, bullying, shrivelled-souled old +devils...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“One +moment,” said Sally. “I’m getting an impression +that you don’t like Mr. Scrymgeour. Am I right?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +thought so. Womanly intuition! Go on.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“He +used to insist on the poor animal doing tricks. I hate seeing a dog +do tricks. Dogs loathe it, you know. They’re frightfully +sensitive. Well, Scrymgeour used to make this spaniel of his do +tricks—fool-things that no self-respecting dogs would do: and +eventually poor old Billy got fed up and jibbed. He was too polite +to bite, but he sort of shook his head and crawled under a chair. +You’d have thought anyone would have let it go at that, but +would old Scrymgeour? Not a bit of it! Of all the poisonous...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +I know. Go on.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +the thing ended in the blighter hauling him out from under the chair +and getting more and more shirty, until finally he laid into him with +a stick. That is to say,” said Ginger, coldly accurate, “he +<i>started</i> laying into him with a stick.” He brooded for a +moment with knit brows. “A spaniel, mind you! Can you imagine +anyone beating a spaniel? It’s like hitting a little girl. +Well, he’s a fairly oldish man, you know, and that hampered me +a bit: but I got hold of the stick and broke it into about eleven +pieces, and by great good luck it was a stick he happened to value +rather highly. It had a gold knob and had been presented to him by +his constituents or something. I minced it up a goodish bit, and +then I told him a fair amount about himself. And then—well, +after that he shot me out, and I came here.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +did not speak for a moment.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +were quite right,” she said at last, in a sober voice that had +nothing in it of her customary flippancy. She paused again. “And +what are you going to do now?” she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’ll +get something?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +yes, I shall get something, I suppose. The family will be pretty +sick, of course.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“For +goodness’ sake! Why do you bother about the family?” +Sally burst out. She could not reconcile this young man’s +flabby dependence on his family with the enterprise and vigour which +he had shown in his dealings with the unspeakable Scrymgeour. Of +course, he had been brought up to look on himself as a rich man’s +son and appeared to have drifted as such young men are wont to do; +but even so...”The whole trouble with you,” she said, +embarking on a subject on which she held strong views, “is +that...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Her +harangue was interrupted by what—at the Normandie, at one +o’clock in the morning—practically amounted to a miracle. + The front door of the hotel opened, and there entered a young man in +evening dress. Such persons were sufficiently rare at the Normandie, +which catered principally for the staid and middle-aged, and this +youth’s presence was due, if one must pause to explain it, to +the fact that, in the middle of his stay at Roville, a disastrous +evening at the Casino had so diminished his funds that he had been +obliged to make a hurried shift from the Hotel Splendide to the +humbler Normandie. His late appearance to-night was caused by the +fact that he had been attending a dance at the Splendide, principally +in the hope of finding there some kind-hearted friend of his +prosperity from whom he might borrow.</p> + +<p class="normal">A +rapid-fire dialogue having taken place between Jules and the +newcomer, the keys were handed through the cage, the door opened and +the lift was set once more in motion. And a few minutes later, +Sally, suddenly aware of an overpowering sleepiness, had switched off +her light and jumped into bed. Her last waking thought was a regret +that she had not been able to speak at length to Mr. Ginger Kemp on +the subject of enterprise, and resolve that the address should be +delivered at the earliest opportunity.</p> + + +<h3 class="chap">CHAPTER III</h3> + +<h3 class="titl">THE DIGNIFIED MR. CARMYLE</h3> + +<h3 class="sect">1</h3> + + +<p class="normal">By +six o’clock on the following evening, however. Sally had been +forced to the conclusion that Ginger would have to struggle through +life as best he could without the assistance of her contemplated +remarks: for she had seen nothing of him all day and in another hour +she would have left Roville on the seven-fifteen express which was to +take her to Paris, <i>en route</i> for Cherbourg and the liner +whereon she had booked her passage for New York.</p> + +<p class="normal">It +was in the faint hope of finding him even now that, at half-past six, +having conveyed her baggage to the station and left it in charge of +an amiable porter, she paid a last visit to the Casino Municipale. +She disliked the thought of leaving Ginger without having uplifted +him. Like so many alert and active-minded girls, she possessed in a +great degree the quality of interesting herself in—or, as her +brother Fillmore preferred to put it, messing about with—the +private affairs of others. Ginger had impressed her as a man to whom +it was worth while to give a friendly shove on the right path; and it +was with much gratification, therefore, that, having entered the +Casino, she perceived a flaming head shining through the crowd which +had gathered at one of the roulette-tables.</p> + +<p class="normal">There +are two Casinos at Roville-sur-Mer. The one on the Promenade goes in +mostly for sea-air and a mild game called <i>boule. </i>It is the +big Casino Municipale down in the Palace Massena near the railway +station which is the haunt of the earnest gambler who means business; +and it was plain to Sally directly she arrived that Ginger Kemp not +only meant business but was getting results. Ginger was going +extremely strong. He was entrenched behind an opulent-looking mound +of square counters: and, even as Sally looked, a wooden-faced +croupier shoved a further instalment across the table to him at the +end of his long rake.</p> + +<p class="normal">“<i>Epatant!”</i> +murmured a wistful man at Sally’s side, removing an elbow from +her ribs in order the better to gesticulate Sally, though no French +scholar, gathered that he was startled and gratified. The entire +crowd seemed to be startled and gratified. There is undoubtedly a +certain altruism in the make-up of the spectators at a Continental +roulette-table. They seem to derive a spiritual pleasure from seeing +somebody else win.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +croupier gave his moustache a twist with his left hand and the wheel +a twist with his right, and silence fell again. Sally, who had +shifted to a spot where the pressure of the crowd was less acute, was +now able to see Ginger’s face, and as she saw it she gave an +involuntary laugh. He looked exactly like a dog at a rat-hole. His +hair seemed to bristle with excitement. One could almost fancy that +his ears were pricked up.</p> + +<p class="normal">In +the tense hush which had fallen on the crowd at the restarting of the +wheel, Sally’s laugh rang out with an embarrassing clearness. +It had a marked effect on all those within hearing. There is +something almost of religious ecstasy in the deportment of the +spectators at a table where anyone is having a run of luck at +roulette, and if she had guffawed in a cathedral she could not have +caused a more pained consternation. The earnest worshippers gazed at +her with shocked eyes, and Ginger, turning with a start, saw her and +jumped up. As he did so, the ball fell with a rattling click into a +red compartment of the wheel; and, as it ceased to revolve and it was +seen that at last the big winner had picked the wrong colour, a +shuddering groan ran through the congregation like that which +convulses the penitents’ bench at a negro revival meeting. +More glances of reproach were cast at Sally. It was generally felt +that her injudicious behaviour had changed Ginger’s luck.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +only person who did not appear to be concerned was Ginger himself. +He gathered up his loot, thrust it into his pocket, and elbowed his +way to where Sally stood, now definitely established in the eyes of +the crowd as a pariah. There was universal regret that he had +decided to call it a day. It was to the spectators as though a star +had suddenly walked off the stage in the middle of his big scene; and +not even a loud and violent quarrel which sprang up at this moment +between two excitable gamblers over a disputed five-franc counter +could wholly console them.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +say,” said Ginger, dexterously plucking Sally out of the crowd, +“this is topping, meeting you like this. I’ve been +looking for you everywhere.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +funny you didn’t find me, then, for that’s where I’ve +been. I was looking for you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +really?” Ginger seemed pleased. He led the way to the quiet +ante-room outside the gambling-hall, and they sat down in a corner. +It was pleasant here, with nobody near except the gorgeously +uniformed attendant over by the door. “That was awfully good +of you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +felt I must have a talk with you before my train went.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +started violently.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Your +train? What do you mean?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +puff-puff,” explained Sally. “I’m leaving +to-night, you know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Leaving?” +Ginger looked as horrified as the devoutest of the congregation of +which Sally had just ceased to be a member. “You don’t +mean <i>leaving?</i> You’re not going away from Roville?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +afraid so.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +why? Where are you going?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Back +to America. My boat sails from Cherbourg tomorrow.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +my aunt!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +sorry,” said Sally, touched by his concern. She was a +warm-hearted girl and liked being appreciated. “But...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +say...” Ginger Kemp turned bright scarlet and glared before him +at the uniformed official, who was regarding their <i>tête-à-tête</i> +with the indulgent eye of one who has been through this sort of thing +himself. “I say, look here, will you marry me?”</p> + +<h3 class="sect">2</h3> + +<p class="normal">Sally +stared at his vermilion profile in frank amazement. Ginger, she had +realized by this time, was in many ways a surprising young man, but +she had not expected him to be as surprising as this.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Marry +you!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +know what I mean.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +yes, I suppose I do. You allude to the holy state. Yes, I know what +you mean.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Then +how about it?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +began to regain her composure. Her sense of humour was tickled. She +looked at Ginger gravely. He did not meet her eye, but continued to +drink in the uniformed official, who was by now so carried away by +the romance of it all that he had begun to hum a love-ballad under +his breath. The official could not hear what they were saying, and +would not have been able to understand it even if he could have +heard; but he was an expert in the language of the eyes.</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +isn’t this—don’t think I am trying to make +difficulties—isn’t this a little sudden?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +got to be sudden,” said Ginger Kemp, complainingly. “I +thought you were going to be here for weeks.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But, +my infant, my babe, has it occurred to you that we are practically +strangers?” She patted his hand tolerantly, causing the +uniformed official to heave a tender sigh. “I see what has +happened,” she said. “You’re mistaking me for some +other girl, some girl you know really well, and were properly +introduced to. Take a good look at me, and you’ll see.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +I take a good look at you,” said Ginger, feverishly, “I’m +dashed if I’ll answer for the consequences.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +this is the man I was going to lecture on ‘Enterprise.’ ”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’re +the most wonderful girl I’ve ever met, dash it!” said +Ginger, his gaze still riveted on the official by the door “I +dare say it <i>is</i> sudden. I can’t help that. I fell in +love with you the moment I saw you, and there you are!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Now, +look here, I know I’m not much of a chap and all that, but... +well, I’ve just won the deuce of a lot of money in there...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Would +you buy me with your gold?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +mean to say, we should have enough to start on, and... of course I’ve +made an infernal hash of everything I’ve tried up till now, but +there must be something I can do, and you can jolly well bet I’d +have a goodish stab at it. I mean to say, with you to buck me up and +so forth, don’t you know. Well, I mean...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Has +it struck you that I may already be engaged to someone else?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +golly! Are you?”</p> + +<p class="normal">For +the first time he turned and faced her, and there was a look in his +eyes which touched Sally and drove all sense of the ludicrous out of +her. Absurd as it was, this man was really serious.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +yes, as a matter of fact I am,” she said soberly.</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +Kemp bit his lip and for a moment was silent.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +well, that’s torn it!” he said at last.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +was aware of an emotion too complex to analyse. There was pity in +it, but amusement too. The emotion, though she did not recognize it, +was maternal. Mothers, listening to their children pleading with +engaging absurdity for something wholly out of their power to bestow, +feel that same wavering between tears and laughter. Sally wanted to +pick Ginger up and kiss him. The one thing she could not do was to +look on him, sorry as she was for him, as a reasonable, grown-up man.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +don’t really mean it, you know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Don’t +I!” said Ginger, hollowly. “Oh, don’t I!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +can’t! There isn’t such a thing in real life as love at +first sight. Love’s a thing that comes when you know a person +well and...” She paused. It had just occurred to her that she +was hardly the girl to lecture in this strain. Her love for Gerald +Foster had been sufficiently sudden, even instantaneous. What did +she know of Gerald except that she loved him? They had become engaged +within two weeks of their first meeting. She found this recollection +damping to her eloquence, and ended by saying tamely:</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +ridiculous.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +had simmered down to a mood of melancholy resignation.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +couldn’t have expected you to care for me, I suppose, anyway,” +he said, sombrely. “I’m not much of a chap.”</p> + +<p class="normal">It +was just the diversion from the theme under discussion which Sally +had been longing to find. She welcomed the chance of continuing the +conversation on a less intimate and sentimental note.</p> + +<p class="normal">“That’s +exactly what I wanted to talk to you about,” she said, seizing +the opportunity offered by this display of humility. “I’ve +been looking for you all day to go on with what I was starting to say +in the lift last night when we were interrupted. Do you mind if I +talk to you like an aunt—or a sister, suppose we say? Really, +the best plan would be for you to adopt me as an honorary sister. +What do you think?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +did not appear noticeably elated at the suggested relationship.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Because +I really do take a tremendous interest in you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +brightened. “That’s awfully good of you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +going to speak words of wisdom. Ginger, why don’t you brace +up?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Brace +up?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +stiffen your backbone and stick out your chin, and square your +elbows, and really amount to something. Why do you simply flop about +and do nothing and leave everything to what you call ‘the +family’? Why do you have to be helped all the time? Why don’t +you help yourself? Why do you have to have jobs found for you? Why +don’t you rush out and get one? Why do you have to worry about +what, ‘the family’ thinks of you? Why don’t you +make yourself independent of them? I know you had hard luck, suddenly +finding yourself without money and all that, but, good heavens, +everybody else in the world who has ever done anything has been broke +at one time or another. It’s part of the fun. You’ll +never get anywhere by letting yourself be picked up by the family +like... like a floppy Newfoundland puppy and dumped down in any old +place that happens to suit them. A job’s a thing you’ve +got to choose for yourself and get for yourself. Think what you can +do—there must be something—and then go at it with a snort +and grab it and hold it down and teach it to take a joke. You’ve +managed to collect some money. It will give you time to look round. +And, when you’ve had a look round, <i>do</i> something! Try to +realize you’re alive, and try to imagine the family isn’t!”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +stopped and drew a deep breath. Ginger Kemp did not reply for a +moment. He seemed greatly impressed.</p> + +<p class="normal">“When +you talk quick,” he said at length, in a serious meditative +voice, “your nose sort of goes all squiggly. Ripping, it +looks!”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +uttered an indignant cry.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do +you mean to say you haven’t been listening to a word I’ve +been saying,” she demanded.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +rather! Oh, by Jove, yes.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +what did I say?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You... +er... And your eyes sort of shine, too.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Never +mind my eyes. What did I say?” +</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +told me,” said Ginger, on reflection, “to get a job.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +yes. I put it much better than that, but that’s what it +amounted to, I suppose. All right, then. I’m glad you...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +was eyeing her with mournful devotion. “I say,” he +interrupted, “I wish you’d let me write to you. +Letters, I mean, and all that. I have an idea it would kind of buck +me up.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +won’t have time for writing letters.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ll +have time to write them to you. You haven’t an address or +anything of that sort in America, have you, by any chance? I mean, so +that I’d know where to write to.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +can give you an address which will always find me.” She told +him the number and street of Mrs. Meecher’s boarding-house, and +he wrote them down reverently on his shirt-cuff. “Yes, on +second thoughts, do write,” she said. “Of course, I +shall want to know how you’ve got on. I... oh, my goodness! +That clock’s not right?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Just +about. What time does your train go?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Go! +It’s gone! Or, at least, it goes in about two seconds.” +She made a rush for the swing-door, to the confusion of the uniformed +official who had not been expecting this sudden activity. “Good-bye, +Ginger. Write to me, and remember what I said.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger, +alert after his unexpected fashion when it became a question of +physical action, had followed her through the swing-door, and they +emerged together and started running down the square.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Stick +it!” said Ginger, encouragingly. He was running easily and +well, as becomes a man who, in his day, had been a snip for his +international at scrum-half.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +saved her breath. The train was beginning to move slowly out of the +station as they sprinted abreast on to the platform. Ginger dived +for the nearest door, wrenched it open, gathered Sally neatly in his +arms, and flung her in. She landed squarely on the toes of a man who +occupied the corner seat, and, bounding off again, made for the +window. Ginger, faithful to the last, was trotting beside the train +as it gathered speed.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ginger! +My poor porter! Tip him. I forgot.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Right +ho!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +don’t forget what I’ve been saying.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Right +ho!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Look +after yourself and ‘Death to the Family!’”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Right +ho!”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +train passed smoothly out of the station. Sally cast one last look +back at her red-haired friend, who had now halted and was waving a +handkerchief. Then she turned to apologize to the other occupant of +the carriage.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +so sorry,” she said, breathlessly. “I hope I didn’t +hurt you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">She +found herself facing Ginger’s cousin, the dark man of +yesterday’s episode on the beach, Bruce Carmyle.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">3</h3> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Carmyle was not a man who readily allowed himself to be disturbed by +life’s little surprises, but at the present moment he could not +help feeling slightly dazed. He recognized Sally now as the French +girl who had attracted his cousin Lancelot’s notice on the +beach. At least he had assumed that she was French, and it was +startling to be addressed by her now in fluent English. How had she +suddenly acquired this gift of tongues? And how on earth had she had +time since yesterday, when he had been a total stranger to her, to +become sufficiently intimate with Cousin Lancelot to be sprinting +with him down station platforms and addressing him out of +railway-carriage windows as Ginger? Bruce Carmyle was aware that most +members of that sub-species of humanity, his cousin’s personal +friends, called him by that familiar—and, so Carmyle held, +vulgar—nickname: but how had this girl got hold of it?</p> + +<p class="normal">If +Sally had been less pretty, Mr. Carmyle would undoubtedly have looked +disapprovingly at her, for she had given his rather rigid sense of +the proprieties a nasty jar. But as, panting and flushed from her +run, she was prettier than any girl he had yet met, he contrived to +smile.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Not +at all,” he said in answer to her question, though it was far +from the truth. His left big toe was aching confoundedly. Even a +girl with a foot as small as Sally’s can make her presence felt +on a man’s toe if the scrum-half who is handling her aims well +and uses plenty of vigour.</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +you don’t mind,” said Sally, sitting down, “I think +I’ll breathe a little.”</p> + +<p class="normal">She +breathed. The train sped on.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Quite +a close thing,” said Bruce Carmyle, affably. The pain in his +toe was diminishing. “You nearly missed it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes. + It was lucky Mr. Kemp was with me. He throws very straight, doesn’t +he.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Tell +me,” said Carmyle, “how do you come to know my Cousin? On +the beach yesterday morning...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +we didn’t know each other then. But we were staying at the +same hotel, and we spent an hour or so shut up in an elevator +together. That was when we really got acquainted.”</p> + +<p class="normal">A +waiter entered the compartment, announcing in unexpected English that +dinner was served in the restaurant car. “Would you care for +dinner?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +starving,” said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +reproved herself, as they made their way down the corridor, for being +so foolish as to judge anyone by his appearance. This man was +perfectly pleasant in spite of his grim exterior. She had decided by +the time they had seated themselves at the table she liked him.</p> + +<p class="normal">At +the table, however, Mr. Carmyle’s manner changed for the worse. + He lost his amiability. He was evidently a man who took his meals +seriously and believed in treating waiters with severity. He +shuddered austerely at a stain on the table-cloth, and then +concentrated himself frowningly on the bill of fare. Sally, +meanwhile, was establishing cosy relations with the much too friendly +waiter, a cheerful old man who from the start seemed to have made up +his mind to regard her as a favourite daughter. The waiter talked no +English and Sally no French, but they were getting along capitally, +when Mr. Carmyle, who had been irritably waving aside the servitor’s +light-hearted advice—at the Hotel Splendide the waiters never +bent over you and breathed cordial suggestions down the side of your +face—gave his order crisply in the Anglo-Gallic dialect of the +travelling Briton. The waiter remarked, <i>“Boum!”</i> +in a pleased sort of way, and vanished.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Nice +old man!” said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Infernally +familiar!” said Mr. Carmyle.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +perceived that on the topic of the waiter she and her host did not +see eye to eye and that little pleasure or profit could be derived +from any discussion centring about him. She changed the subject. +She was not liking Mr. Carmyle quite so much as she had done a few +minutes ago, but it was courteous of him to give her dinner, and she +tried to like him as much as she could.</p> + +<p class="normal">“By +the way,” she said, “my name is Nicholas. I always think +it’s a good thing to start with names, don’t you?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Mine...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +I know yours. Ginger—Mr. Kemp told me.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Carmyle, who since the waiter’s departure, had been thawing, +stiffened again at the mention of Ginger.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Indeed?” +he said, coldly. “Apparently you got intimate.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +did not like his tone. He seemed to be criticizing her, and she +resented criticism from a stranger. Her eyes opened wide and she +looked dangerously across the table.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why +‘apparently’? I told you that we had got intimate, and I +explained how. You can’t stay shut up in an elevator half the +night with anybody without getting to know him. I found Mr. Kemp +very pleasant.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Really?” + +</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +very interesting.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Carmyle raised his eyebrows.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Would +you call him interesting?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +<i>did</i> call him interesting.” Sally was beginning to feel +the exhilaration of battle. Men usually made themselves extremely +agreeable to her, and she reacted belligerently under the stiff +unfriendliness which had come over her companion in the last few +minutes.</p> + +<p class="normal">“He +told me all about himself.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +you found that interesting?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why +not?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well...” +A frigid half-smile came and went on Bruce Carmyle’s dark face. + “My cousin has many excellent qualities, no doubt—he +used to play football well, and I understand that he is a capable +amateur pugilist—but I should not have supposed him +entertaining. We find him a little dull.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +thought it was only royalty that called themselves ‘we.’ +“</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +meant myself—and the rest of the family.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +mention of the family was too much for Sally. She had to stop +talking in order to allow her mind to clear itself of rude thoughts.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Mr. +Kemp was telling me about Mr. Scrymgeour,” she went on at +length.</p> + +<p class="normal">Bruce +Carmyle stared for a moment at the yard or so of French bread which +the waiter had placed on the table.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Indeed?” +he said. “He has an engaging lack of reticence.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +waiter returned bearing soup and dumped it down.</p> + +<p class="normal">“<i>V’la!”</i> +he observed, with the satisfied air of a man who has successfully +performed a difficult conjuring trick. He smiled at Sally +expectantly, as though confident of applause from this section of his +audience at least. But Sally’s face was set and rigid. She +had been snubbed, and the sensation was as pleasant as it was novel.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +think Mr. Kemp had hard luck,” she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +you will excuse me, I would prefer not to discuss the matter.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Carmyle’s attitude was that Sally might be a pretty girl, but +she was a stranger, and the intimate affairs of the Family were not +to be discussed with strangers, however prepossessing.</p> + +<p class="normal">“He +was quite in the right. Mr. Scrymgeour was beating a dog...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ve +heard the details.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +I didn’t know that. Well, don’t you agree with me, +then?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +do not. A man who would throw away an excellent position simply +because...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +well, if that’s your view, I suppose it <i>is</i> useless to +talk about it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Quite.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Still, +there’s no harm in asking what you propose to do about +Gin—about Mr. Kemp.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Carmyle became more glacial.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +afraid I cannot discuss...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally’s +quick impatience, nobly restrained till now, finally got the better +of her.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +for goodness’ sake,” she snapped, “do try to be +human, and don’t always be snubbing people. You remind me of +one of those portraits of men in the eighteenth century, with wooden +faces, who look out of heavy gold frames at you with fishy eyes as if +you were a regrettable incident.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Rosbif,” +said the waiter genially, manifesting himself suddenly beside them as +if he had popped up out of a trap.</p> + +<p class="normal">Bruce +Carmyle attacked his roast beef morosely. Sally who was in the mood +when she knew that she would be ashamed of herself later on, but was +full of battle at the moment, sat in silence.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +am sorry,” said Mr. Carmyle ponderously, “if my eyes are +fishy. The fact has not been called to my attention before.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +suppose you never had any sisters,” said Sally. “They +would have told you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Carmyle relapsed into an offended dumbness, which lasted till the +waiter had brought the coffee.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +think,” said Sally, getting up, “I’ll be going now. + I don’t seem to want any coffee, and, if I stay on, I may say +something rude. I thought I might be able to put in a good word for +Mr. Kemp and save him from being massacred, but apparently it’s +no use. Good-bye, Mr. Carmyle, and thank you for giving me dinner.”</p> + +<p class="normal">She +made her way down the car, followed by Bruce Carmyle’s +indignant, yet fascinated, gaze. Strange emotions were stirring in +Mr. Carmyle’s bosom.</p> + + +<h3 class="chap">CHAPTER IV</h3> + +<h3 class="titl">GINGER IN DANGEROUS MOOD</h3> + + +<p class="normal">Some +few days later, owing to the fact that the latter, being +preoccupied, did not see him first, Bruce Carmyle met his cousin +Lancelot in Piccadilly. They had returned by different routes from +Roville, and Ginger would have preferred the separation to continue. +He was hurrying on with a nod, when Carmyle stopped him.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Just +the man I wanted to see,” he observed.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +hullo!” said Ginger, without joy.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +was thinking of calling at your club.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes. + Cigarette?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +peered at the proffered case with the vague suspicion of the man who +has allowed himself to be lured on to the platform and is accepting a +card from the conjurer. He felt bewildered. In all the years of +their acquaintance he could not recall another such exhibition of +geniality on his cousin’s part. He was surprised, indeed, at +Mr. Carmyle’s speaking to him at all, for the <i>affaire</i> +Scrymgeour remained an un-healed wound, and the Family, Ginger knew, +were even now in session upon it.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Been +back in London long?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Day +or two.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +heard quite by accident that you had returned and that you were +staying at the club. By the way, thank you for introducing me to +Miss Nicholas.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +started violently.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +was in that compartment, you know, at Roville Station. You threw her +right on top of me. We agreed to consider that an introduction. An +attractive girl.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Bruce +Carmyle had not entirely made up his mind regarding Sally, but on one +point he was clear, that she should not, if he could help it, pass +out of his life. Her abrupt departure had left him with that baffled +and dissatisfied feeling which, though it has little in common with +love at first sight, frequently produces the same effects. She had +had, he could not disguise it from himself, the better of their late +encounter and he was conscious of a desire to meet her again and show +her that there was more in him than she apparently supposed. Bruce +Carmyle, in a word, was piqued: and, though he could not quite decide +whether he liked or disliked Sally, he was very sure that a future +without her would have an element of flatness.</p> + +<p class="normal">“A +very attractive girl. We had a very pleasant talk.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +bet you did,” said Ginger enviously.</p> + +<p class="normal">“By +the way, she did not give you her address by any chance?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why?” +said Ginger suspiciously. His attitude towards Sally’s address +resembled somewhat that of a connoisseur who has acquired a unique +work of art. He wanted to keep it to himself and gloat over it.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +I—er—I promised to send her some books she was anxious to +read...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +shouldn’t think she gets much time for reading.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Books +which are not published in America.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +pretty nearly everything is published in America, what? Bound to be, +I mean.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +these particular books are not,” said Mr. Carmyle shortly. He +was finding Ginger’s reserve a little trying, and wished that +he had been more inventive.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Give +them to me and I’ll send them to her,” suggested Ginger.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Good +Lord, man!” snapped Mr. Carmyle. “I’m capable of +sending a few books to America. Where does she live?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +revealed the sacred number of the holy street which had the luck to +be Sally’s headquarters. He did it because with a persistent +devil like his cousin there seemed no way of getting out of it: but +he did it grudgingly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Thanks.” +Bruce Carmyle wrote the information down with a gold pencil in a +dapper little morocco-bound note-book. He was the sort of man who +always has a pencil, and the backs of old envelopes never enter into +his life.</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was a pause. Bruce Carmyle coughed.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +saw Uncle Donald this morning,” he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">His +manner had lost its geniality. There was no need for it now, and he +was a man who objected to waste. He spoke coldly, and in his voice +there was a familiar sub-tingle of reproof.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes?” +said Ginger moodily. This was the uncle in whose office he had made +his debut as a hasher: a worthy man, highly respected in the National +Liberal Club, but never a favourite of Ginger’s. There were +other minor uncles and a few subsidiary aunts who went to make up the +Family, but Uncle Donald was unquestionably the managing director of +that body and it was Ginger’s considered opinion that in this +capacity he approximated to a human blister.</p> + +<p class="normal">“He +wants you to dine with him to-night at Bleke’s.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger’s +depression deepened. A dinner with Uncle Donald would hardly have +been a cheerful function, even in the surroundings of a banquet in +the Arabian Nights. There was that about Uncle Donald’s +personality which would have cast a sobering influence over the +orgies of the Emperor Tiberius at Capri. To dine with him at a +morgue like that relic of Old London, Bleke’s Coffee House, +which confined its custom principally to regular patrons who had not +missed an evening there for half a century, was to touch something +very near bed-rock. Ginger was extremely doubtful whether flesh and +blood were equal to it.</p> + +<p class="normal">“To-night?” +he said. “Oh, you mean to-night? Well...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Don’t +be a fool. You know as well as I do that you’ve got to go.” +Uncle Donald’s invitations were royal commands in the Family. +“If you’ve another engagement you must put it off.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +all right.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Seven-thirty +sharp.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“All +right,” said Ginger gloomily.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +two men went their ways, Bruce Carmyle eastwards because he had +clients to see in his chambers at the Temple; Ginger westwards +because Mr. Carmyle had gone east. There was little sympathy between +these cousins: yet, oddly enough, their thoughts as they walked +centred on the same object. Bruce Carmyle, threading his way briskly +through the crowds of Piccadilly Circus, was thinking of Sally: and +so was Ginger as he loafed aimlessly towards Hyde Park Corner, +bumping in a sort of coma from pedestrian to pedestrian.</p> + +<p class="normal">Since +his return to London Ginger had been in bad shape. He mooned through +the days and slept poorly at night. If there is one thing rottener +than another in a pretty blighted world, one thing which gives a +fellow the pip and reduces him to the condition of an absolute onion, +it is hopeless love. Hopeless love had got Ginger all stirred up. +His had been hitherto a placid soul. Even the financial crash which +had so altered his life had not bruised him very deeply. His +temperament had enabled him to bear the slings and arrows of +outrageous fortune with a philosophic “Right ho!” But now +everything seemed different. Things irritated him acutely, which +before he had accepted as inevitable—his Uncle Donald’s +moustache, for instance, and its owner’s habit of employing it +during meals as a sort of zareba or earthwork against the assaults of +soup.</p> + +<p class="normal">“By +gad!” thought Ginger, stopping suddenly opposite Devonshire +House. “If he uses that damned shrubbery as soup-strainer +to-night, I’ll slosh him with a fork!”</p> + +<p class="normal">Hard +thoughts... hard thoughts! And getting harder all the time, for +nothing grows more quickly than a mood of rebellion. Rebellion is a +forest fire that flames across the soul. The spark had been lighted +in Ginger, and long before he reached Hyde Park Corner he was ablaze +and crackling. By the time he returned to his club he was +practically a menace to society—to that section of it, at any +rate, which embraced his Uncle Donald, his minor uncles George and +William, and his aunts Mary, Geraldine, and Louise.</p> + +<p class="normal">Nor +had the mood passed when he began to dress for the dismal festivities +of Bleke’s Coffee House. He scowled as he struggled morosely +with an obstinate tie. One cannot disguise the fact—Ginger was +warming up. And it was just at this moment that Fate, as though it +had been waiting for the psychological instant, applied the finishing +touch. There was a knock at the door, and a waiter came in with a +telegram.</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +looked at the envelope. It had been readdressed and forwarded on +from the Hotel Normandie. It was a wireless, handed in on board the +White Star liner <i>Olympic, </i>and it ran as follows:</p> + +<p class="normal"><i>Remember. + Death to the Family. S.</i></p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +sat down heavily on the bed.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +driver of the taxi-cab which at twenty-five minutes past seven drew +up at the dingy door of Bleke’s Coffee House in the Strand was +rather struck by his fare’s manner and appearance. A +determined-looking sort of young bloke, was the taxi-driver’s +verdict.</p> + + +<h3 class="chap">CHAPTER V</h3> + +<h3 class="titl">SALLY HEARS NEWS</h3> + +<p class="normal">It +had been Sally’s intention, on arriving in New York, to take a +room at the St. Regis and revel in the gilded luxury to which her +wealth entitled her before moving into the small but comfortable +apartment which, as soon as she had the time, she intended to find +and make her permanent abode. But when the moment came and she was +giving directions to the taxi-driver at the dock, there seemed to her +something revoltingly Fillmorian about the scheme. It would be time +enough to sever herself from the boarding-house which had been her +home for three years when she had found the apartment. Meanwhile, +the decent thing to do, if she did not want to brand herself in the +sight of her conscience as a female Fillmore, was to go back +temporarily to Mrs. Meecher’s admirable establishment and +foregather with her old friends. After all, home is where the heart +is, even if there are more prunes there than the gourmet would +consider judicious.</p> + +<p class="normal">Perhaps +it was the unavoidable complacency induced by the thought that she +was doing the right thing, or possibly it was the tingling +expectation of meeting Gerald Foster again after all these weeks of +separation, that made the familiar streets seem wonderfully bright as +she drove through them. It was a perfect, crisp New York morning, +all blue sky and amber sunshine, and even the ash-cans had a +stimulating look about them. The street cars were full of happy +people rollicking off to work: policemen directed the traffic with +jaunty affability: and the white-clad street-cleaners went about +their poetic tasks with a quiet but none the less noticeable relish. +It was improbable that any of these people knew that she was back, +but somehow they all seemed to be behaving as though this were a +special day.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +first discordant note in this overture of happiness was struck by +Mrs. Meecher, who informed Sally, after expressing her gratification +at the news that she required her old room, that Gerald Foster had +left town that morning.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Gone +to Detroit, he has,” said Mrs. Meecher. “Miss Doland, +too.” She broke off to speak a caustic word to the +boarding-house handyman, who, with Sally’s trunk as a weapon, +was depreciating the value of the wall-paper in the hall. “There’s +that play of his being tried out there, you know, Monday,” +resumed Mrs. Meecher, after the handyman had bumped his way up the +staircase. “They been rehearsing ever since you left.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +was disappointed, but it was such a beautiful morning, and New York +was so wonderful after the dull voyage in the liner that she was not +going to allow herself to be depressed without good reason. After +all, she could go on to Detroit tomorrow. It was nice to have +something to which she could look forward.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +is Elsa in the company?” she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Sure. + And very good too, I hear.” Mrs. Meecher kept abreast of +theatrical gossip. She was an ex-member of the profession herself, +having been in the first production of “Florodora,” +though, unlike everybody else, not one of the original Sextette. +“Mr. Faucitt was down to see a rehearsal, and he said Miss +Doland was fine. And he’s not easy to please, as you know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“How +is Mr. Faucitt?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mrs. +Meecher, not unwillingly, for she was a woman who enjoyed the +tragedies of life, made her second essay in the direction of lowering +Sally’s uplifted mood.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Poor +old gentleman, he ain’t over and above well. Went to bed early +last night with a headache, and this morning I been to see him and he +<i>don’t</i> look well. There’s a lot of this Spanish +influenza about. It might be that. Lots o’ people have been +dying of it, if you believe what you see in the papers,” said +Mrs. Meecher buoyantly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Good +gracious! You don’t think... ?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +he ain’t turned black,” admitted Mrs. Meecher with +regret. “They say they turn black. If you believe what you +see in the papers, that is. Of course, that may come later,” +she added with the air of one confident that all will come right in +the future. “The doctor’ll be in to see him pretty soon. + He’s quite happy. Toto’s sitting with him.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally’s +concern increased. Like everyone who had ever spent any length of +time in the house, she had strong views on Toto. This quadruped, who +stained the fame of the entire canine race by posing as a dog, was a +small woolly animal with a persistent and penetrating yap, hard to +bear with equanimity in health and certainly quite outside the range +of a sick man. Her heart bled for Mr. Faucitt. Mrs. Meecher, on the +other hand, who held a faith in her little pet’s amiability and +power to soothe which seven years’ close association had been +unable to shake, seemed to feel that, with Toto on the spot, all that +could be done had been done as far as pampering the invalid was +concerned.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +must go up and see him,” cried Sally. “Poor old dear.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Sure. + You know his room. You can hear Toto talking to him now,” +said Mrs. Meecher complacently. “He wants a cracker, that’s +what he wants. Toto likes a cracker after breakfast.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +invalid’s eyes, as Sally entered the room, turned wearily to +the door. At the sight of Sally they lit up with an incredulous +rapture. Almost any intervention would have pleased Mr. Faucitt at +that moment, for his little playmate had long outstayed any welcome +that might originally have been his: but that the caller should be +his beloved Sally seemed to the old man something in the nature of a +return of the age of miracles.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Sally!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“One +moment. Here, Toto!”</p> + +<p class="normal">Toto, +struck momentarily dumb by the sight of food, had jumped off the bed +and was standing with his head on one side, peering questioningly at +the cracker. He was a suspicious dog, but he allowed himself to be +lured into the passage, upon which Sally threw the cracker down and +slipped in and shut the door. Toto, after a couple of yaps, which +may have been gratitude or baffled fury, trotted off downstairs, and +Mr. Faucitt drew a deep breath.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Sally, +you come, as ever, as an angel of mercy. Our worthy Mrs. Meecher +means well, and I yield to no man in my respect for her innate +kindness of heart: but she errs in supposing that that thrice-damned +whelp of hers is a combination of sick-nurse, soothing medicine, and +a week at the seaside. She insisted on bringing him here. He was +yapping then, as he was yapping when, with womanly resource which I +cannot sufficiently praise, you decoyed him hence. And each yap went +through me like hammer-strokes on sheeted tin. Sally, you stand +alone among womankind. You shine like a good deed in a naughty +world. When did you get back?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ve +only just arrived in my hired barouche from the pier.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +you came to see your old friend without delay? I am grateful and +flattered. Sally, my dear.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Of +course I came to see you. Do you suppose that, when Mrs. Meecher +told me you were sick, I just said ‘Is that so?’ and went +on talking about the weather? Well, what do you mean by it? +Frightening everybody. Poor old darling, do you feel very bad?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“One +thousand individual mice are nibbling the base of my spine, and I am +conscious of a constant need of cooling refreshment. But what of +that? Your presence is a tonic. Tell me, how did our Sally enjoy +foreign travel?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Our +Sally had the time of her life.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Did +you visit England?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Only +passing through.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“How +did it look?” asked Mr. Faucitt eagerly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Moist. + Very moist.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +would,” said Mr. Faucitt indulgently. “I confess that, +happy as I have been in this country, there are times when I miss +those wonderful London days, when a sort of cosy brown mist hangs +over the streets and the pavements ooze with a perspiration of mud +and water, and you see through the haze the yellow glow of the Bodega +lamps shining in the distance like harbour-lights. Not,” said +Mr. Faucitt, “that I specify the Bodega to the exclusion of +other and equally worthy hostelries. I have passed just as pleasant +hours in Rule’s and Short’s. You missed something by not +lingering in England, Sally.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +know I did—pneumonia.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Faucitt shook his head reproachfully.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +are prejudiced, my dear. You would have enjoyed London if you had +had the courage to brave its superficial gloom. Where did you spend +your holiday? Paris?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Part +of the time. And the rest of the while I was down by the sea. It +was glorious. I don’t think I would ever have come back if I +hadn’t had to. But, of course, I wanted to see you all again. +And I wanted to be at the opening of Mr. Foster’s play. Mrs. +Meecher tells me you went to one of the rehearsals.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +attended a dog-fight which I was informed was a rehearsal,” +said Mr. Faucitt severely. “There is no rehearsing nowadays.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh +dear! Was it as bad as all that?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +play is good. The play—I will go further—is excellent. +It has fat. But the acting...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Mrs. +Meecher said you told her that Elsa was good.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Our +worthy hostess did not misreport me. Miss Doland has great +possibilities. She reminds me somewhat of Matilda Devine, under +whose banner I played a season at the Old Royalty in London many +years ago. She has the seeds of greatness in her, but she is wasted +in the present case on an insignificant part. There is only one part +in the play. I allude to the one murdered by Miss Mabel Hobson.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Murdered!” +Sally’s heart sank. She had been afraid of this, and it was no +satisfaction to feel that she had warned Gerald. “Is she very +terrible?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“She +has the face of an angel and the histrionic ability of that curious +suet pudding which our estimable Mrs. Meecher is apt to give us on +Fridays. In my professional career I have seen many cases of what I +may term the Lady Friend in the role of star, but Miss Hobson +eclipses them all. I remember in the year ’94 a certain scion +of the plutocracy took it into his head to present a female for whom +he had conceived an admiration in a part which would have taxed the +resources of the ablest. I was engaged in her support, and at the +first rehearsal I recollect saying to my dear old friend, Arthur +Moseby—dead, alas, these many years. An excellent juvenile, +but, like so many good fellows, cursed with a tendency to lift the +elbow—I recollect saying to him ‘Arthur, dear boy, I give +it two weeks.’ ‘Max,’ was his reply, ‘you are +an incurable optimist. One consecutive night, laddie, one +consecutive night.’ We had, I recall, an even half-crown upon +it. He won. We opened at Wigan, our leading lady got the bird, and +the show closed next day. I was forcibly reminded of this incident +as I watched Miss Hobson rehearsing.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +poor Ger—poor Mr. Foster!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +do not share your commiseration for that young man,” said Mr. +Faucitt austerely. “You probably are almost a stranger to him, +but he and I have been thrown together a good deal of late. A young +man upon whom, mark my words, success, if it ever comes, will have +the worst effects. I dislike him. Sally. He is, I think, without +exception, the most selfish and self-centred young man of my +acquaintance. He reminds me very much of old Billy Fothergill, with +whom I toured a good deal in the later eighties. Did I ever tell you +the story of Billy and the amateur who... ?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +was in no mood to listen to the adventures of Mr. Fothergill. The +old man’s innocent criticism of Gerald had stabbed her deeply. +A momentary impulse to speak hotly in his defence died away as she +saw Mr. Faucitt’s pale, worn old face. He had meant no harm, +after all. How could he know what Gerald was to her?</p> + +<p class="normal">She +changed the conversation abruptly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Have +you seen anything of Fillmore while I’ve been away?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Fillmore? +Why yes, my dear, curiously enough I happened to run into him on +Broadway only a few days ago. He seemed changed—less stiff and +aloof than he had been for some time past. I may be wronging him, +but there have been times of late when one might almost have fancied +him a trifle up-stage. All that was gone at our last encounter. He +appeared glad to see me and was most cordial.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +found her composure restored. Her lecture on the night of the party +had evidently, she thought, not been wasted. Mr. Faucitt, however, +advanced another theory to account for the change in the Man of +Destiny.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +rather fancy,” he said, “that the softening influence has +been the young man’s fiancée.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What? +Fillmore’s not engaged?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Did +he not write and tell you? I suppose he was waiting to inform you +when you returned. Yes, Fillmore is betrothed. The lady was with +him when we met. A Miss Winch. In the profession, I understand. He +introduced me. A very charming and sensible young lady, I thought.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +shook her head.</p> + +<p class="normal">“She +can’t be. Fillmore would never have got engaged to anyone like +that. Was her hair crimson?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Brown, +if I recollect rightly.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Very +loud, I suppose, and overdressed?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“On +the contrary, neat and quiet.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’ve +made a mistake,” said Sally decidedly. “She can’t +have been like that. I shall have to look into this. It does seem +hard that I can’t go away for a few weeks without all my +friends taking to beds of sickness and all my brothers getting +ensnared by vampires.”</p> + +<p class="normal">A +knock at the door interrupted her complaint. Mrs. Meecher entered, +ushering in a pleasant little man with spectacles and black bag.</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +doctor to see you, Mr. Faucitt.” Mrs. Meecher cast an +appraising eye at the invalid, as if to detect symptoms of +approaching discoloration. “I’ve been telling him that +what <i>I</i> think you’ve gotten is this here new Spanish +influenza. Two more deaths there were in the paper this morning, if +you can believe what you see...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +wonder,” said the doctor, “if you would mind going and +bringing me a small glass of water?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why, +sure.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Not +a large glass—a small glass. Just let the tap run for a few +moments and take care not to spill any as you come up the stairs. I +always ask ladies, like our friend who has just gone,” he added +as the door closed, “to bring me a glass of water. It keeps +them amused and interested and gets them out of the way, and they +think I am going to do a conjuring trick with it. As a matter of +fact, I’m going to drink it. Now let’s have a look at +you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +examination did not take long. At the end of it the doctor seemed +somewhat chagrined.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Our +good friend’s diagnosis was correct. I’d give a leg to +say it wasn’t, but it was. It <i>is</i> this here new Spanish +influenza. Not a bad attack. You want to stay in bed and keep warm, +and I’ll write you out a prescription. You ought to be nursed. + Is this young lady a nurse?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +no, merely...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Of +course I’m a nurse,” said Sally decidedly. “It +isn’t difficult, is it, doctor? I know nurses smooth pillows. +I can do that. Is there anything else?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Their +principal duty is to sit here and prevent the excellent and garrulous +lady who has just left us from getting in. They must also be able to +aim straight with a book or an old shoe, if that small woolly dog I +met downstairs tries to force an entrance. If you are equal to these +tasks, I can leave the case in your hands with every confidence.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But, +Sally, my dear,” said Mr. Faucitt, concerned, “you must +not waste your time looking after me. You have a thousand things to +occupy you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“There’s +nothing I want to do more than help you to get better. I’ll +just go out and send a wire, and then I’ll be right back.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Five +minutes later, Sally was in a Western Union office, telegraphing to +Gerald that she would be unable to reach Detroit in time for the +opening.</p> + +<h3 class="chap">CHAPTER VI</h3> + +<h3 class="titl">FIRST AID FOR FILLMORE</h3> + +<h3 class="sect">1</h3> + +<p class="normal">It +was not till the following Friday that Sally was able to start for +Detroit. She arrived on the Saturday morning and drove to the Hotel +Statler. Having ascertained that Gerald was stopping in the hotel +and having ‘phoned up to his room to tell him to join her, she +went into the dining-room and ordered breakfast.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +felt low-spirited as she waited for the food to arrive. The nursing +of Mr. Faucitt had left her tired, and she had not slept well on the +train. But the real cause of her depression was the fact that there +had been a lack of enthusiasm in Gerald’s greeting over the +telephone just now. He had spoken listlessly, as though the fact of +her returning after all these weeks was a matter of no account, and +she felt hurt and perplexed.</p> + +<p class="normal">A +cup of coffee had a stimulating effect. Men, of course, were always +like this in the early morning. It would, no doubt, be a very +different Gerald who would presently bound into the dining-room, +quickened and restored by a cold shower-bath. In the meantime, here +was food, and she needed it.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +was pouring out her second cup of coffee when a stout young man, of +whom she had caught a glimpse as he moved about that section of the +hotel lobby which was visible through the open door of the +dining-room, came in and stood peering about as though in search of +someone. The momentary sight she had had of this young man had +interested Sally. She had thought how extraordinarily like he was to +her brother Fillmore. Now she perceived that it was Fillmore +himself.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +was puzzled. What could Fillmore be doing so far west? She had +supposed him to be a permanent resident of New York. But, of course, +your man of affairs and vast interests flits about all over the +place. At any rate, here he was, and she called him. And, after he +had stood in the doorway looking in every direction except the right +one for another minute, he saw her and came over to her table.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why, +Sally?” His manner, she thought, was nervous—one might +almost have said embarrassed. She attributed this to a guilty +conscience. Presently he would have to break to her the news that he +had become engaged to be married without her sisterly sanction, and +no doubt he was wondering how to begin. “What are you doing +here? I thought you were in Europe.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +got back a week ago, but I’ve been nursing poor old Mr. Faucitt +ever since then. He’s been ill, poor old dear. I’ve +come here to see Mr. Foster’s play, ‘The Primrose Way,’ +you know. Is it a success?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +hasn’t opened yet.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Don’t +be silly, Fill. Do pull yourself together. It opened last Monday.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +it didn’t. Haven’t you heard? They’ve closed all +the theatres because of this infernal Spanish influenza. Nothing has +been playing this week. You must have seen it in the papers.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +haven’t had time to read the papers. Oh, Fill, what an awful +shame!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +it’s pretty tough. Makes the company all on edge. I’ve +had the darndest time, I can tell you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why, +what have you got to do with it?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +coughed.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I—er—oh, +I didn’t tell you that. I’m sort of—er— +mixed up in the show. Cracknell—you remember he was at college +with me—suggested that I should come down and look at it. +Shouldn’t wonder if he wants me to put money into it and so +on.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +thought he had all the money in the world.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +he has a lot, but these fellows like to let a pal in on a good +thing.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Is +it a good thing?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +play’s fine.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“That’s +what Mr. Faucitt said. But Mabel Hobson...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore’s +ample face registered emotion.</p> + +<p class="normal">“She’s +an awful woman, Sally! She can’t act, and she throws her weight +about all the time. The other day there was a fuss about a +paper-knife...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“How +do you mean, a fuss about a paper-knife?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“One +of the props, you know. It got mislaid. I’m certain it wasn’t +my fault...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“How +could it have been your fault?” asked Sally wonderingly. Love +seemed to have the worst effects on Fillmore’s mentality.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well—er—you +know how it is. Angry woman... blames the first person she sees... +This paper-knife...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore’s +voice trailed off into pained silence.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Mr. +Faucitt said Elsa Doland was good.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +she’s all right,” said Fillmore indifferently. “But—” +His face brightened and animation crept into his voice. “But +the girl you want to watch is Miss Winch. Gladys Winch. She plays +the maid. She’s only in the first act, and hasn’t much +to say, except ‘Did you ring, madam?’ and things like +that. But it’s the way she says ‘em! Sally, that girl’s +a genius! The greatest character actress in a dozen years! You mark +my words, in a darned little while you’ll see her name up on +Broadway in electric light. Personality? Ask me! Charm? She wrote +the words and music! Looks?...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“All +right! All right! I know all about it, Fill. And will you kindly +inform me how you dared to get engaged without consulting me?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +blushed richly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +do you know?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes. + Mr. Faucitt told me.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +I’m only human,” argued Fillmore.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +call that a very handsome admission. You’ve got quite modest, +Fill.”</p> + +<p class="normal">He +had certainly changed for the better since their last meeting.</p> + +<p class="normal">It +was as if someone had punctured him and let out all the pomposity. +If this was due, as Mr. Faucitt had suggested, to the influence of +Miss Winch, Sally felt that she could not but approve of the romance.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ll +introduce you sometime,’ said Fillmore.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +want to meet her very much.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ll +have to be going now. I’ve got to see Bunbury. I thought he +might be in here.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Who’s +Bunbury?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +producer. I suppose he is breakfasting in his room. I’d +better go up.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +<i>are</i> busy, aren’t you. Little marvel! It’s lucky +they’ve got you to look after them.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +retired and Sally settled down to wait for Gerald, no longer hurt by +his manner over the telephone. Poor Gerald! No wonder he had seemed +upset.</p> + +<p class="normal">A +few minutes later he came in.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +Jerry darling,” said Sally, as he reached the table, “I’m +so sorry. I’ve just been hearing about it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Gerald +sat down. His appearance fulfilled the promise of his voice over the +telephone. A sort of nervous dullness wrapped him about like a +garment.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +just my luck,” he said gloomily. “It’s the kind of +thing that couldn’t happen to anyone but me. Damned fools! +Where’s the sense in shutting the theatres, even if there is +influenza about? They let people jam against one another all day in +the stores. If that doesn’t hurt them why should it hurt them +to go to theatres? Besides, it’s all infernal nonsense about +this thing. I don’t believe there is such a thing as Spanish +influenza. People get colds in their heads and think they’re +dying. It’s all a fake scare.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t think it’s that,” said Sally. “Poor +Mr. Faucitt had it quite badly. That’s why I couldn’t +come earlier.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Gerald +did not seem interested either by the news of Mr. Faucitt’s +illness or by the fact that Sally, after delay, had at last arrived. +He dug a spoon sombrely into his grape-fruit.</p> + +<p class="normal">“We’ve +been hanging about here day after day, getting bored to death all the +time... The company’s going all to pieces. They’re sick +of rehearsing and rehearsing when nobody knows if we’ll ever +open. They were all keyed up a week ago, and they’ve been +sagging ever since. It will ruin the play, of course. My first +chance! Just chucked away.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +was listening with a growing feeling of desolation. She tried to be +fair, to remember that he had had a terrible disappointment and was +under a great strain. And yet... it was unfortunate that self-pity +was a thing she particularly disliked in a man. Her vanity, too, was +hurt. It was obvious that her arrival, so far from acting as a magic +restorative, had effected nothing. She could not help remembering, +though it made her feel disloyal, what Mr. Faucitt had said about +Gerald. She had never noticed before that he was remarkably +self-centred, but he was thrusting the fact upon her attention now.</p> + +<p class="normal">“That +Hobson woman is beginning to make trouble,” went on Gerald, +prodding in a despairing sort of way at scrambled eggs. “She +ought never to have had the part, never. She can’t handle it. +Elsa Doland could play it a thousand times better. I wrote Elsa in a +few lines the other day, and the Hobson woman went right up in the +air. You don’t know what a star is till you’ve seen one +of these promoted clothes-props from the Follies trying to be one. +It took me an hour to talk her round and keep her from throwing up +her part.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why +not let her throw up her part?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“For +heaven’s sake talk sense,” said Gerald querulously. “Do +you suppose that man Cracknell would keep the play on if she wasn’t +in it? He would close the show in a second, and where would I be +then? You don’t seem to realize that this is a big chance for +me. I’d look a fool throwing it away.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +see,” said Sally, shortly. She had never felt so wretched in +her life. Foreign travel, she decided, was a mistake. It might be +pleasant and broadening to the mind, but it seemed to put you so out +of touch with people when you got back. She analysed her sensations, +and arrived at the conclusion that what she was resenting was the +fact that Gerald was trying to get the advantages of two attitudes +simultaneously. A man in trouble may either be the captain of his +soul and superior to pity, or he may be a broken thing for a woman to +pet and comfort. Gerald, it seemed to her, was advertising himself +as an object for her commiseration, and at the same time raising a +barrier against it. He appeared to demand her sympathy while holding +himself aloof from it. She had the uncomfortable sensation of +feeling herself shut out and useless.</p> + +<p class="normal">“By +the way,” said Gerald, “there’s one thing. I have +to keep her jollying along all the time, so for goodness’ sake +don’t go letting it out that we’re engaged.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally’s +chin went up with a jerk. This was too much.</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +you find it a handicap being engaged to me...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Don’t +be silly.” Gerald took refuge in pathos. “Good God! It’s +tough! Here am I, worried to death, and you...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Before +he could finish the sentence, Sally’s mood had undergone one of +those swift changes which sometimes made her feel that she must be +lacking in character. A simple, comforting thought had come to her, +altering her entire outlook. She had come off the train tired and +gritty, and what seemed the general out-of-jointness of the world was +entirely due, she decided, to the fact that she had not had a bath +and that her hair was all anyhow. She felt suddenly tranquil. If it +was merely her grubby and dishevelled condition that made Gerald seem +to her so different, all was well. She put her hand on his with a +quick gesture of penitence.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +so sorry,” she said. “I’ve been a brute, but I do +sympathize, really.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ve +had an awful time,” mumbled Gerald.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +know, I know. But you never told me you were glad to see me.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Of +course I’m glad to see you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why +didn’t you say so, then, you poor fish? And why didn’t +you ask me if I had enjoyed myself in Europe?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Did +you enjoy yourself?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +except that I missed you so much. There! Now we can consider my +lecture on foreign travel finished, and you can go on telling me your +troubles.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Gerald +accepted the invitation. He spoke at considerable length, though +with little variety. It appeared definitely established in his mind +that Providence had invented Spanish influenza purely with a view to +wrecking his future. But now he seemed less aloof, more open to +sympathy. The brief thunderstorm had cleared the air. Sally lost +that sense of detachment and exclusion which had weighed upon her.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well,” +said Gerald, at length, looking at his watch, “I suppose I had +better be off.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Rehearsal?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +confound it. It’s the only way of getting through the day. +Are you coming along?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ll +come directly I’ve unpacked and tidied myself up.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“See +you at the theatre, then.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +went out and rang for the lift to take her up to her room.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">2</h3> + +<p class="normal">The +rehearsal had started when she reached the theatre. As she entered +the dark auditorium, voices came to her with that thin and reedy +effect which is produced by people talking in an empty building. She +sat down at the back of the house, and, as her eyes grew accustomed +to the gloom, was able to see Gerald sitting in the front row beside +a man with a bald head fringed with orange hair whom she took +correctly to be Mr. Bunbury, the producer. Dotted about the house in +ones and twos were members of the company whose presence was not +required in the first act. On the stage, Elsa Doland, looking very +attractive, was playing a scene with a man in a bowler hat. She was +speaking a line, as Sally came in.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why, +what do you mean, father?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Tiddly-omty-om,” +was the bowler-hatted one’s surprising reply. +“Tiddly-omty-om... long speech ending in ‘find me in the +library.’ <i>And exit,”</i> said the man in the bowler +hat, starting to do so.</p> + +<p class="normal">For +the first time Sally became aware of the atmosphere of nerves. Mr. +Bunbury, who seemed to be a man of temperament, picked up his +walking-stick, which was leaning against the next seat, and flung it +with some violence across the house.</p> + +<p class="normal">“For +God’s sake!” said Mr. Bunbury.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Now +what?” inquired the bowler hat, interested, pausing hallway +across the stage.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do +speak the lines, Teddy,” exclaimed Gerald. “Don’t +skip them in that sloppy fashion.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +don’t want me to go over the whole thing?” asked the +bowler hat, amazed.</p> + +<p class="normal">“<i>Yes!”</i></p> + +<p class="normal">“Not +the whole damn thing?” queried the bowler hat, fighting with +incredulity.</p> + +<p class="normal">“This +is a rehearsal,” snapped Mr. Bunbury. “If we are not +going to do it properly, what’s the use of doing it at all?”</p> + +<p class="normal">This +seemed to strike the erring Teddy, if not as reasonable, at any rate +as one way of looking at it. He delivered the speech in an injured +tone and shuffled off. The atmosphere of tenseness was unmistakable +now. Sally could feel it. The world of the theatre is simply a +large nursery and its inhabitants children who readily become fretful +if anything goes wrong. The waiting and the uncertainty, the loafing +about in strange hotels in a strange city, the dreary rehearsing of +lines which had been polished to the last syllable more than a week +ago—these things had sapped the nerve of the Primrose Way +company and demoralization had set in. It would require only a +trifle to produce an explosion.</p> + +<p class="normal">Elsa +Doland now moved to the door, pressed a bell, and, taking a magazine +from the table, sat down in a chair near the footlights. A moment +later, in answer to the ring, a young woman entered, to be greeted +instantly by an impassioned bellow from Mr. Bunbury.</p> + +<p class="normal">“<i>Miss +Winch!”</i></p> + +<p class="normal">The +new arrival stopped and looked out over the footlights, not in the +pained manner of the man in the bowler hat, but with the sort of +genial indulgence of one who has come to a juvenile party to amuse +the children. She was a square, wholesome, good-humoured looking +girl with a serious face, the gravity of which was contradicted by +the faint smile that seemed to lurk about the corner of her mouth. +She was certainly not pretty, and Sally, watching her with keen +interest, was surprised that Fillmore had had the sense to disregard +surface homeliness and recognize her charm. Deep down in Fillmore, +Sally decided, there must lurk an unsuspected vein of intelligence.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Hello?” +said Miss Winch, amiably.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Bunbury seemed profoundly moved.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Miss +Winch, did I or did I not ask you to refrain from chewing gum during +rehearsal?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“That’s +right, so you did,” admitted Miss Winch, chummily.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Then +why are you doing it?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore’s +fiancée revolved the critized refreshment about her tongue for +a moment before replying.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Bit +o’ business,” she announced, at length.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +do you mean, a bit of business?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Character +stuff,” explained Miss Winch in her pleasant, drawling voice. +“Thought it out myself. Maids chew gum, you know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Bunbury ruffled his orange hair in an over-wrought manner with the +palm of his right hand.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Have +you ever seen a maid?” he asked, despairingly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +<i>sir. </i>And they chew gum.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +mean a parlour-maid in a smart house,” moaned Mr. Bunbury. “Do +you imagine for a moment that in a house such as this is supposed to +be the parlour-maid would be allowed to come into the drawing-room +champing that disgusting, beastly stuff?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Miss +Winch considered the point.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Maybe +you’re right.” She brightened. “Listen! Great +idea! Mr. Foster can write in a line for Elsa, calling me down, and +another giving me a good come-back, and then another for Elsa saying +something else, and then something really funny for me, and so on. +We can work it up into a big comic scene. Five or six minutes, all +laughs.”</p> + +<p class="normal">This +ingenious suggestion had the effect of depriving the producer +momentarily of speech, and while he was struggling for utterance, +there dashed out from the wings a gorgeous being in blue velvet and a +hat of such unimpeachable smartness that Sally ached at the sight of +it with a spasm of pure envy.</p> + +<p class="normal">“<i>Say!”</i></p> + +<p class="normal">Miss +Mabel Hobson had practically every personal advantage which nature +can bestow with the exception of a musical voice. Her figure was +perfect, her face beautiful, and her hair a mass of spun gold; but +her voice in moments of emotion was the voice of a peacock.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Say, +listen to me for just one moment!”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Bunbury recovered from his trance.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Miss +Hobson! Please!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +that’s all very well...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +are interrupting the rehearsal.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +bet your sorrowful existence I’m interrupting the rehearsal,” +agreed Miss Hobson, with emphasis. “And, if you want to make a +little easy money, you go and bet somebody ten seeds that I’m +going to interrupt it again every time there’s any talk of +writing up any darned part in the show except mine. Write up other +people’s parts? Not while I have my strength!”</p> + +<p class="normal">A +young man with butter-coloured hair, who had entered from the wings +in close attendance on the injured lady, attempted to calm the storm.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Now, +sweetie!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +can it, Reggie!” said Miss Hobson, curtly.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Cracknell obediently canned it. He was not one of your brutal +cave-men. He subsided into the recesses of a high collar and began +to chew the knob of his stick.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +the star,” resumed Miss Hobson, vehemently, “and, if you +think anybody else’s part’s going to be written up... +well, pardon me while I choke with laughter! If so much as a syllable +is written into anybody’s part, I walk straight out on my two +feet. You won’t see me go, I’ll be so quick.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Bunbury sprang to his feet and waved his hands.</p> + +<p class="normal">“For +heaven’s sake! Are we rehearsing, or is this a debating +society? Miss Hobson, nothing is going to be written into anybody’s +part. Now are you satisfied?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“She +said...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +never mind,” observed Miss Winch, equably. “It was only +a random thought. Working for the good of the show all the time. +That’s me.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Now, +sweetie!” pleaded Mr. Cracknell, emerging from the collar like +a tortoise.</p> + +<p class="normal">Miss +Hobson reluctantly allowed herself to be reassured.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +well, that’s all right, then. But don’t forget I know +how to look after myself,” she said, stating a fact which was +abundantly obvious to all who had had the privilege of listening to +her. “Any raw work, and out I walk so quick it’ll make +you giddy.”</p> + +<p class="normal">She +retired, followed by Mr. Cracknell, and the wings swallowed her up.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Shall +I say my big speech now?” inquired Miss Winch, over the +footlights.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +yes! Get on with the rehearsal. We’ve wasted half the +morning.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Did +you ring, madam?” said Miss Winch to Elsa, who had been reading +her magazine placidly through the late scene.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +rehearsal proceeded, and Sally watched it with a sinking heart. It +was all wrong. Novice as she was in things theatrical, she could see +that. There was no doubt that Miss Hobson was superbly beautiful and +would have shed lustre on any part which involved the minimum of +words and the maximum of clothes: but in the pivotal role of a +serious play, her very physical attributes only served to emphasize +and point her hopeless incapacity. Sally remembered Mr. Faucitt’s +story of the lady who got the bird at Wigan. She did not see how +history could fail to repeat itself. The theatrical public of +America will endure much from youth and beauty, but there is a limit.</p> + +<p class="normal">A +shrill, passionate cry from the front row, and Mr. Bunbury was on his +feet again. Sally could not help wondering whether things were going +particularly wrong to-day, or whether this was one of Mr. Bunbury’s +ordinary mornings.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Miss +Hobson!”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +action of the drama had just brought that emotional lady on left +centre and had taken her across to the desk which stood on the other +side of the stage. The desk was an important feature of the play, +for it symbolized the absorption in business which, exhibited by her +husband, was rapidly breaking Miss Hobson’s heart. He loved +his desk better than his young wife, that was what it amounted to, +and no wife can stand that sort of thing.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +gee!” said Miss Hobson, ceasing to be the distressed wife and +becoming the offended star. “What’s it this time?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +suggested at the last rehearsal and at the rehearsal before and the +rehearsal before that, that, on that line, you, should pick up the +paper-knife and toy negligently with it. You did it yesterday, and +to-day you’ve forgotten it again.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“My +God!” cried Miss Hobson, wounded to the quick., “If this +don’t beat everything! How the heck can I toy negligently with +a paper-knife when there’s no paper-knife for me to toy +negligently with?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +paper-knife is on the desk.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +not on the desk.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No +paper-knife?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No +paper-knife. And it’s no good picking on me. I’m the +star, not the assistant stage manager. If you’re going to pick +on anybody, pick on him.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +advice appeared to strike Mr. Bunbury as good. He threw back his +head and bayed like a bloodhound.</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was a momentary pause, and then from the wings on the prompt side +there shambled out a stout and shrinking figure, in whose hand was a +script of the play and on whose face, lit up by the footlights, there +shone a look of apprehension. It was Fillmore, the Man of Destiny.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">3</h3> + +<p class="normal">Alas, +poor Fillmore! He stood in the middle of the stage with the lightning +of Mr. Bunbury’s wrath playing about his defenceless head, and +Sally, recovering from her first astonishment, sent a wave of +sisterly commiseration floating across the theatre to him. She did +not often pity Fillmore. His was a nature which in the sunshine of +prosperity had a tendency to grow a trifle lush; and such of the +minor ills of life as had afflicted him during the past three years, +had, she considered, been wholesome and educative and a matter not +for concern but for congratulation. Unmoved, she had watched him +through that lean period lunching on coffee and buckwheat cakes, and +curbing from motives of economy a somewhat florid taste in dress. +But this was different. This was tragedy. Somehow or other, +blasting disaster must have smitten the Fillmore bank-roll, and he +was back where he had started. His presence here this morning could +mean nothing else.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +recalled his words at the breakfast-table about financing the play. +How like Fillmore to try to save his face for the moment with an +outrageous bluff, though well aware that he would have to reveal the +truth sooner or later. She realized how he must have felt when he +had seen her at the hotel. Yes, she was sorry for Fillmore.</p> + +<p class="normal">And, +as she listened to the fervent eloquence of Mr. Bunbury, she +perceived that she had every reason to be. Fillmore was having a bad +time. One of the chief articles of faith in the creed of all +theatrical producers is that if anything goes wrong it must be the +fault of the assistant stage manager and Mr. Bunbury was evidently +orthodox in his views. He was showing oratorical gifts of no mean +order. The paper-knife seemed to inspire him. Gradually, Sally +began to get the feeling that this harmless, necessary stage-property +was the source from which sprang most, if not all, of the trouble in +the world. It had disappeared before. Now it had disappeared again. + Could Mr. Bunbury go on struggling in a universe where this sort of +thing happened? He seemed to doubt it. Being a red-blooded, +one-hundred-per-cent American man, he would try hard, but it was a +hundred to one shot that he would get through. He had asked for a +paper-knife. There was no paper-knife. Why was there no +paper-knife? Where <i>was</i> the paper-knife anyway?</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +assure you, Mr. Bunbury,” bleated the unhappy Fillmore, +obsequiously. “I placed it with the rest of the properties +after the last rehearsal.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +couldn’t have done.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +assure you I did.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +it walked away, I suppose,” said Miss Hobson with cold scorn, +pausing in the operation of brightening up her lower lip with a +lip-stick.</p> + +<p class="normal">A +calm, clear voice spoke.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +was taken away,” said the calm, clear voice.</p> + +<p class="normal">Miss +Winch had added herself to the symposium. She stood beside Fillmore, +chewing placidly. It took more than raised voices and gesticulating +hands to disturb Miss Winch.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Miss +Hobson took it,” she went on in her cosy, drawling voice. “I +saw her.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sensation +in court. The prisoner, who seemed to feel his position deeply, cast +a pop-eyed glance full of gratitude at his advocate. Mr. Bunbury, in +his capacity of prosecuting attorney, ran his fingers through his +hair in some embarrassment, for he was regretting now that he had +made such a fuss. Miss Hobson thus assailed by an underling, spun +round and dropped the lip-stick, which was neatly retrieved by the +assiduous Mr. Cracknell. Mr. Cracknell had his limitations, but he +was rather good at picking up lip-sticks.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What’s +that? <i>I </i>took it? I never did anything of the sort.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Miss +Hobson took it after the rehearsal yesterday,” drawled Gladys +Winch, addressing the world in general, “and threw it +negligently at the theatre cat.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Miss +Hobson seemed taken aback. Her composure was not restored by Mr. +Bunbury’s next remark. The producer, like his company, had +been feeling the strain of the past few days, and, though as a rule +he avoided anything in the nature of a clash with the temperamental +star, this matter of the missing paper-knife had bitten so deeply +into his soul that he felt compelled to speak his mind.</p> + +<p class="normal">“In +future, Miss Hobson, I should be glad if, when you wish to throw +anything at the cat, you would not select a missile from the property +box. Good heavens!” he cried, stung by the way fate was +maltreating him, “I have never experienced anything like this +before. I have been producing plays all my life, and this is the +first time this has happened. I have produced Nazimova. Nazimova +never threw paper-knives at cats.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +I hate cats,” said Miss Hobson, as though that settled it.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I,” +murmured Miss Winch, “love little pussy, her fur is so warm, +and if I don’t hurt her she’ll do me no...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +my heavens!” shouted Gerald Foster, bounding from his seat and +for the first time taking a share in the debate. “Are we going +to spend the whole day arguing about cats and paper-knives? For +goodness’ sake, clear the stage and stop wasting time.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Miss +Hobson chose to regard this intervention as an affront.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Don’t +shout at me, Mr. Foster!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +wasn’t shouting at you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +you have anything to say to me, lower your voice.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“He +can’t,” observed Miss Winch. “He’s a tenor.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Nazimova +never...” began Mr. Bunbury.</p> + +<p class="normal">Miss +Hobson was not to be diverted from her theme by reminiscences of +Nazimova. She had not finished dealing with Gerald.</p> + +<p class="normal">“In +the shows I’ve been in,” she said, mordantly, “the +author wasn’t allowed to go about the place getting fresh with +the leading lady. In the shows I’ve been in the author sat at +the back and spoke when he was spoken to. In the shows I’ve +been in…”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +was tingling all over. This reminded her of the dog-fight on the +Roville sands. She wanted to be in it, and only the recognition that +it was a private fight and that she would be intruding kept her +silent. The lure of the fray, however, was too strong for her wholly +to resist it. Almost unconsciously, she had risen from her place and +drifted down the aisle so as to be nearer the white-hot centre of +things. She was now standing in the lighted space by the +orchestra-pit, and her presence attracted the roving attention of +Miss Hobson, who, having concluded her remarks on authors and their +legitimate sphere of activity, was looking about for some other +object of attack.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Who +the devil,” inquired Miss Hobson, “is <i>that?”</i></p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +found herself an object of universal scrutiny and wished that she had +remained in the obscurity of the back rows.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +am Mr. Nicholas’ sister,” was the best method of +identification that she could find.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Who’s +Mr. Nicholas?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +timidly admitted that he was Mr. Nicholas. He did it in the manner +of one in the dock pleading guilty to a major charge, and at least +half of those present seemed surprised. To them, till now, Fillmore +had been a nameless thing, answering to the shout of “Hi!”</p> + +<p class="normal">Miss +Hobson received the information with a laugh of such exceeding +bitterness that strong men blanched and Mr. Cracknell started so +convulsively that he nearly jerked his collar off its stud.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Now, +sweetie!” urged Mr. Cracknell.</p> + +<p class="normal">Miss +Hobson said that Mr. Cracknell gave her a pain in the gizzard. She +recommended his fading away, and he did so—into his collar. He +seemed to feel that once well inside his collar he was “home” +and safe from attack.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +through!” announced Miss Hobson. It appeared that Sally’s +presence had in some mysterious fashion fulfilled the function of the +last straw. “This is the by-Goddest show I was ever in! I can +stand for a whole lot, but when it comes to the assistant stage +manager being allowed to fill the theatre with his sisters and his +cousins and his aunts it’s time to quit.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But, +sweetie!” pleaded Mr. Cracknell, coming to the surface.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +go and choke yourself!” said Miss Hobson, crisply. And, +swinging round like a blue panther, she strode off. A door banged, +and the sound of it seemed to restore Mr. Cracknell’s power of +movement. He, too, shot up stage and disappeared.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Hello, +Sally,” said Elsa Doland, looking up from her magazine. The +battle, raging all round her, had failed to disturb her detachment. +“When did you get back?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +trotted up the steps which had been propped against the stage to form +a bridge over the orchestra pit.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Hello, +Elsa.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +late debaters had split into groups. Mr. Bunbury and Gerald were +pacing up and down the central aisle, talking earnestly. Fillmore +had subsided into a chair.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do +you know Gladys Winch?” asked Elsa.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +shook hands with the placid lodestar of her brother’s +affections. Miss Winch, on closer inspection, proved to have deep +grey eyes and freckles. Sally’s liking for her increased.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Thank +you for saving Fillmore from the wolves,” she said. “They +would have torn him in pieces but for you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +I don’t know,” said Miss Winch.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +was noble.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +well!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +think,” said Sally, “I’ll go and have a talk with +Fillmore. He looks as though he wanted consoling.”</p> + +<p class="normal">She +made her way to that picturesque ruin.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">4</h3> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +had the air of a man who thought it wasn’t loaded. A wild, +startled expression had settled itself upon his face and he was +breathing heavily.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Cheer +up!” said Sally. Fillmore jumped like a stricken jelly. “Tell +me all,” said Sally, sitting down beside him. “I leave +you a gentleman of large and independent means, and I come back and +find you one of the wage-slaves again. How did it all happen?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Sally,” +said Fillmore, “I will be frank with you. Can you lend me ten +dollars?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t see how you make that out an answer to my question, but +here you are.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Thanks.” +Fillmore pocketed the bill. “I’ll let you have it back +next week. I want to take Miss Winch out to lunch.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +that’s what you want it for, don’t look on it as a loan, +take it as a gift with my blessing thrown in.” She looked over +her shoulder at Miss Winch, who, the cares of rehearsal being +temporarily suspended, was practising golf-shots with an umbrella at +the other side of the stage. “However did you have the sense +to fall in love with her, Fill?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do +you like her?” asked Fillmore, brightening.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +love her.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +knew you would. She’s just the right girl for me, isn’t +she?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“She +certainly is.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“So +sympathetic.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“So kind.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes. +And she’s got brains enough for two, which is the exact +quantity the girl who marries you will need.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +drew himself up with as much hauteur as a stout man sitting in a low +chair can achieve.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Some +day I will make you believe in me, Sally.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Less +of the Merchant Prince, my lad,” said Sally, firmly. “You +just confine yourself to explaining how you got this way, instead of +taking up my valuable time telling me what you mean to do in the +future. You’ve lost all your money?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +have suffered certain reverses,” said Fillmore, with dignity, +“which have left me temporarily... Yes, every bean,” he +concluded simply.</p> + +<p class="normal">“How?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well...” +Fillmore hesitated. “I’ve had bad luck, you know. First +I bought Consolidated Rails for the rise, and they fell. So that +went wrong.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +then I bought Russian Roubles for the fall, and they rose. So that +went wrong.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Good +gracious! Why, I’ve heard all this before.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Who +told you?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +I remember now. It’s just that you remind me of a man I met at +Roville. He was telling me the story of his life, and how he had +made a hash of everything. Well, that took all you had, I suppose?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Not +quite. I had a few thousand left, and I went into a deal that really +did look cast-iron.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +that went wrong!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +wasn’t my fault,” said Fillmore querulously. “It +was just my poisonous luck. A man I knew got me to join a syndicate +which had bought up a lot of whisky. The idea was to ship it into +Chicago in herring-barrels. We should have cleaned up big, only a +mutt of a detective took it into his darned head to go fooling about +with a crowbar. Officious ass! It wasn’t as if the barrels +weren’t labelled ‘Herrings’ as plainly as they +could be,” said Fillmore with honest indignation. He +shuddered. “I nearly got arrested.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +that went wrong? Well, that’s something to be thankful for. +Stripes wouldn’t suit your figure.” Sally gave his arm a +squeeze. She was very fond of Fillmore, though for the good of his +soul she generally concealed her affection beneath a manner which he +had once compared, not without some reason, to that of a governess +who had afflicted their mutual childhood. “Never mind, you +poor ill-used martyr. Things are sure to come right. We shall see +you a millionaire some day. And, oh heavens, brother Fillmore, what +a bore you’ll be when you are! I can just see you being +interviewed and giving hints to young men on how to make good. ‘Mr. +Nicholas attributes his success to sheer hard work. He can lay his +hand on his bulging waistcoat and say that he has never once indulged +in those rash get-rich-quick speculations, where you buy for the rise +and watch things fall and then rush out and buy for the fall and +watch ‘em rise.’ Fill... I’ll tell you what I’ll +do. They all say it’s the first bit of money that counts in +building a vast fortune. I’ll lend you some of mine.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +will? Sally, I always said you were an ace.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +never heard you. You oughtn’t to mumble so.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Will +you lend me twenty thousand dollars?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +patted his hand soothingly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Come +slowly down to earth,” she said. “Two hundred was the +sum I had in mind.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +want twenty thousand.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’d +better rob a bank. Any policeman will direct you to a good bank.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ll +tell you <i>why</i> I want twenty thousand.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +might just mention it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +I had twenty thousand, I’d buy this production from Cracknell. +He’ll be back in a few minutes to tell us that the Hobson woman +has quit: and, if she really has, you take it from me that he will +close the show. And, even if he manages to jolly her along this time +and she comes back, it’s going to happen sooner or later. It’s +a shame to let a show like this close. I believe in it, Sally. It’s +a darn good play. With Elsa Doland in the big part, it couldn’t +fail.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +started. Her money was too recent for her to have grown fully +accustomed to it, and she had never realized that she was in a +position to wave a wand and make things happen on any big scale. The +financing of a theatrical production had always been to her something +mysterious and out of the reach of ordinary persons like herself. +Fillmore, that spacious thinker, had brought it into the sphere of +the possible.</p> + +<p class="normal">“He’d +sell for less than that, of course, but one would need a bit in hand. + You have to face a loss on the road before coming into New York. +I’d give you ten per cent on your money, Sally.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +found herself wavering. The prudent side of her nature, which +hitherto had steered her safely through most of life’s rapids, +seemed oddly dormant. Sub-consciously she was aware that on past +performances Fillmore was decidedly not the man to be allowed control +of anybody’s little fortune, but somehow the thought did not +seem to grip her. He had touched her imagination.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +a gold-mine!”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally’s +prudent side stirred in its sleep. Fillmore had chosen an +unfortunate expression. To the novice in finance the word gold-mine +had repellent associations. If there was one thing in which Sally +had proposed not to invest her legacy, it was a gold-mine; what she +had had in view, as a matter of fact, had been one of those little +fancy shops which are called Ye Blue Bird or Ye Corner Shoppe, or +something like that, where you sell exotic bric-a-brac to the wealthy +at extortionate prices. She knew two girls who were doing splendidly +in that line. As Fillmore spoke those words, Ye Corner Shoppe +suddenly looked very good to her.</p> + +<p class="normal">At +this moment, however, two things happened. Gerald and Mr. Bunbury, +in the course of their perambulations, came into the glow of the +footlights, and she was able to see Gerald’s face: and at the +same time Mr. Reginald Cracknell hurried on to the stage, his whole +demeanour that of the bearer of evil tidings.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +sight of Gerald’s face annihilated Sally’s prudence at a +single stroke. Ye Corner Shoppe, which a moment before had been +shining brightly before her mental eye, flickered and melted out. +The whole issue became clear and simple. Gerald was miserable and +she had it in her power to make him happy. He was sullenly awaiting +disaster and she with a word could avert it. She wondered that she +had ever hesitated.</p> + +<p class="normal">“All +right,” she said simply.</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +quivered from head to foot. A powerful electric shock could not have +produced a stronger convulsion. He knew Sally of old as cautious and +clear-headed, by no means to be stampeded by a brother’s +eloquence; and he had never looked on this thing as anything better +than a hundred to one shot.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’ll +do it?” he whispered, and held his breath. After all he might +not have heard correctly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“<i>Yes.”</i></p> + +<p class="normal">All +the complex emotion in Fillmore’s soul found expression in one +vast whoop. It rang through the empty theatre like the last trump, +beating against the back wall and rising in hollow echoes to the very +gallery. Mr. Bunbury, conversing in low undertones with Mr. +Cracknell across the footlights, shied like a startled mule. There +was reproach and menace in the look he cast at Fillmore, and a minute +earlier it would have reduced that financial magnate to apologetic +pulp. But Fillmore was not to be intimidated now by a look. He +strode down to the group at the footlights,</p> + +<p class="normal">“Cracknell,” +he said importantly, “one moment, I should like a word with +you.”</p> + + +<h3 class="chap">CHAPTER VII</h3> + +<h3 class="titl">SOME MEDITATIONS ON SUCCESS</h3> + +<p class="normal">If +actors and actresses are like children in that they are readily +depressed by disaster, they have the child’s compensating gift +of being easily uplifted by good fortune. It amazed Sally that any +one mortal should have been able to spread such universal happiness +as she had done by the simple act of lending her brother Fillmore +twenty thousand dollars. If the Millennium had arrived, the members +of the Primrose Way Company could not have been on better terms with +themselves. The lethargy and dispiritedness, caused by their week of +inaction, fell from them like a cloak. The sudden elevation of that +creature of the abyss, the assistant stage manager, to the dizzy +height of proprietor of the show appealed to their sense of drama. +Most of them had played in pieces where much the same thing had +happened to the persecuted heroine round about eleven o’clock, +and the situation struck them as theatrically sound. Also, now that +she had gone, the extent to which Miss Hobson had acted as a blight +was universally recognized.</p> + +<p class="normal">A +spirit of optimism reigned, and cheerful rumours became current. The +bowler-hatted Teddy had it straight from the lift-boy at his hotel +that the ban on the theatres was to be lifted on Tuesday at the +latest; while no less an authority than the cigar-stand girl at the +Pontchatrain had informed the man who played the butler that Toledo +and Cleveland were opening to-morrow. It was generally felt that the +sun was bursting through the clouds and that Fate would soon despair +of the hopeless task of trying to keep good men down.</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +was himself again. We all have our particular mode of +self-expression in moments of elation. Fillmore’s took the +shape of buying a new waistcoat and a hundred half-dollar cigars and +being very fussy about what he had for lunch. It may have been an +optical illusion, but he appeared to Sally to put on at least six +pounds in weight on the first day of the new regime. As a serf +looking after paper-knives and other properties, he had been—for +him—almost slim. As a manager he blossomed out into soft +billowy curves, and when he stood on the sidewalk in front of the +theatre, gloating over the new posters which bore the legend,</p> + +<p class="normal"><br></p> + +<p class="center">FILLMORE NICHOLAS</p> + +<p class="center">PRESENTS</p> + +<p class="normal"><br> +</p> + +<p class="left">the +populace had to make a detour to get round him.</p> + +<p class="normal">In +this era of bubbling joy, it was hard that Sally, the fairy godmother +responsible for it all, should not have been completely happy too; +and it puzzled her why she was not. But whatever it was that cast +the faint shadow refused obstinately to come out from the back of her +mind and show itself and be challenged. It was not till she was out +driving in a hired car with Gerald one afternoon on Belle Isle that +enlightenment came.</p> + +<p class="normal">Gerald, +since the departure of Miss Hobson, had been at his best. Like +Fillmore, he was a man who responded to the sunshine of prosperity. +His moodiness had vanished, and all his old charm had returned. And +yet... it seemed to Sally, as the car slid smoothly through the +pleasant woods and fields by the river, that there was something that +jarred.</p> + +<p class="normal">Gerald +was cheerful and talkative. He, at any rate, found nothing wrong +with life. He held forth spaciously on the big things he intended to +do.</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +this play get over—and it’s going to—I’ll +show ‘em!” His jaw was squared, and his eyes glowed as +they stared into the inviting future. “One success—that’s +all I need—then watch me! I haven’t had a chance yet, +but...”</p> + +<p class="normal">His +voice rolled on, but Sally had ceased to listen. It was the time of +year when the chill of evening follows swiftly on the mellow warmth +of afternoon. The sun had gone behind the trees, and a cold wind was +blowing up from the river. And quite suddenly, as though it was the +wind that had cleared her mind, she understood what it was that had +been lurking at the back of her thoughts. For an instant it stood +out nakedly without concealment, and the world became a forlorn +place. She had realized the fundamental difference between man’s +outlook on life and woman’s.</p> + +<p class="normal">Success! +How men worshipped it, and how little of themselves they had to spare +for anything else. Ironically, it was the theme of this very play of +Gerald’s which she had saved from destruction. Of all the men +she knew, how many had any view of life except as a race which they +must strain every nerve to win, regardless of what they missed by the +wayside in their haste? Fillmore—Gerald—all of them. +There might be a woman in each of their lives, but she came second +—an afterthought—a thing for their spare time. Gerald +was everything to her. His success would never be more than a +side-issue as far as she was concerned. He himself, without any of +the trappings of success, was enough for her. But she was not enough +for him. A spasm of futile jealousy shook her. She shivered.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Cold?” +said Gerald. “I’ll tell the man to drive back... I don’t +see any reason why this play shouldn’t run a year in New York. +Everybody says it’s good... if it does get over, they’ll +all be after me. I...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +stared out into a bleak world. The sky was a leaden grey, and the +wind from the river blew with a dismal chill.</p> + + +<h3 class="chap">CHAPTER VIII</h3> + +<h3 class="titl">REAPPEARANCE OF MR. CARMYLE—AND GINGER</h3> + +<h3 class="sect">1</h3> + +<p class="normal">When +Sally left Detroit on the following Saturday, accompanied by +Fillmore, who was returning to the metropolis for a few days in order +to secure offices and generally make his presence felt along +Broadway, her spirits had completely recovered. She felt guiltily +that she had been fanciful, even morbid. Naturally men wanted to get +on in the world. It was their job. She told herself that she was +bound up with Gerald’s success, and that the last thing of +which she ought to complain was the energy he put into efforts of +which she as well as he would reap the reward.</p> + +<p class="normal">To +this happier frame of mind the excitement of the last few days had +contributed. Detroit, that city of amiable audiences, had liked “The +Primrose Way.” The theatre, in fulfilment of Teddy’s +prophecy, had been allowed to open on the Tuesday, and a full house, +hungry for entertainment after its enforced abstinence, had welcomed +the play wholeheartedly. The papers, not always in agreement with +the applause of a first-night audience, had on this occasion endorsed +the verdict, with agreeable unanimity hailing Gerald as the coming +author and Elsa Doland as the coming star. There had even been a +brief mention of Fillmore as the coming manager. But there is always +some trifle that jars in our greatest moments, and Fillmore’s +triumph had been almost spoilt by the fact that the only notice taken +of Gladys Winch was by the critic who printed her name—spelt +Wunch—in the list of those whom the cast “also included.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“One +of the greatest character actresses on the stage,” said +Fillmore bitterly, talking over this outrage with Sally on the +morning after the production.</p> + +<p class="normal">From +this blow, however, his buoyant nature had soon enabled him to rally. + Life contained so much that was bright that it would have been +churlish to concentrate the attention on the one dark spot. Business +had been excellent all through the week. Elsa Doland had got better +at every performance. The receipt of a long and agitated telegram +from Mr. Cracknell, pleading to be allowed to buy the piece back, the +passage of time having apparently softened Miss Hobson, was a +pleasant incident. And, best of all, the great Ike Schumann, who +owned half the theatres in New York and had been in Detroit +superintending one of his musical productions, had looked in one +evening and stamped “The Primrose Way” with the seal of +his approval. As Fillmore sat opposite Sally on the train, he +radiated contentment and importance.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +do,” said Sally, breaking a long silence.</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +awoke from happy dreams.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Eh?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +said ‘Yes, do.’ I think you owe it to your position.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do +what?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Buy +a fur coat. Wasn’t that what you were meditating about?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Don’t +be a chump,” said Fillmore, blushing nevertheless. It was true +that once or twice during the past week he had toyed negligently, as +Mr. Bunbury would have said, with the notion, and why not? A fellow +must keep warm.</p> + +<p class="normal">“With +an astrakhan collar,” insisted Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">“As +a matter of fact,” said Fillmore loftily, his great soul +ill-attuned to this badinage, “what I was really thinking about +at the moment was something Ike said.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ike?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ike +Schumann. He’s on the train. I met him just now.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“We +call him Ike!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Of +course I call him Ike,” said Fillmore heatedly. “Everyone +calls him Ike.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“<i>He</i> +wears a fur coat,” Sally murmured.</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +registered annoyance.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +wish you wouldn’t keep on harping on that damned coat. And, +anyway, why shouldn’t I have a fur coat?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Fill... +! How can you be so brutal as to suggest that I ever said you +shouldn’t? Why, I’m one of the strongest supporters of +the fur coat. With big cuffs. And you must roll up Fifth Avenue in +your car, and I’ll point and say ‘That’s my +brother!’ ‘Your brother? No!’ ‘He is, +really.’ ‘You’re joking. Why, that’s the +great Fillmore Nicholas.’ ‘I know. But he really is my +brother. And I was with him when he bought that coat.’ “</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do +leave off about the coat!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“‘And +it isn’t only the coat,’ I shall say. ‘It’s +what’s underneath. Tucked away inside that mass of fur, +dodging about behind that dollar cigar, is one to whom we point with +pride... ‘ “</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +looked coldly at his watch.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ve +got to go and see Ike Schumann.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“We +are in hourly consultation with Ike.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“He +wants to see me about the show. He suggests putting it into Chicago +before opening in New York.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh +no,” cried Sally, dismayed.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why +not?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +recovered herself. Identifying Gerald so closely with his play, she +had supposed for a moment that if the piece opened in Chicago it +would mean a further prolonged separation from him. But of course +there would be no need, she realized, for him to stay with the +company after the first day or two.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’re +thinking that we ought to have a New York reputation before tackling +Chicago. There’s a lot to be said for that. Still, it works +both ways. A Chicago run would help us in New York. Well, I’ll +have to think it over,” said Fillmore, importantly, “I’ll +have to think it over.”</p> + +<p class="normal">He +mused with drawn brows.</p> + +<p class="normal">“All +wrong,” said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Eh?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Not +a bit like it. The lips should be compressed and the forefinger of +the right hand laid in a careworn way against the right temple. +You’ve a lot to learn. Fill.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +stop it!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Fillmore +Nicholas,” said Sally, “if you knew what pain it gives me +to josh my only brother, you’d be sorry for me. But you know +it’s for your good. Now run along and put Ike out of his +misery. I know he’s waiting for you with his watch out. ‘You +<i>do</i> think he’ll come, Miss Nicholas?’ were his last +words to me as he stepped on the train, and oh, Fill, the yearning in +his voice. ‘Why, of <i>course</i> he will, Mr. Schumann,’ +I said. ‘For all his exalted position, my brother is +kindliness itself. Of course he’ll come.’ ‘If I +could only think so!’ he said with a gulp. ‘If I could +only think so. But you know what these managers are. A thousand +calls on their time. They get brooding on their fur coats and forget +everything else.’ ‘Have no fear, Mr. Schumann,’ I +said. ‘Fillmore Nicholas is a man of his word.’ “</p> + +<p class="normal">She +would have been willing, for she was a girl who never believed in +sparing herself where it was a question of entertaining her nearest +and dearest, to continue the dialogue, but Fillmore was already +moving down the car, his rigid back a silent protest against sisterly +levity. Sally watched him disappear, then picked up a magazine and +began to read.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +had just finished tracking a story of gripping interest through a +jungle of advertisements, only to find that it was in two parts, of +which the one she was reading was the first, when a voice spoke.</p> + +<p class="normal">“How +do you do, Miss Nicholas?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Into +the seat before her, recently released from the weight of the coming +manager, Bruce Carmyle of all people in the world insinuated himself +with that well-bred air of deferential restraint which never left +him.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">2</h3> + +<p class="normal">Sally +was considerably startled. Everybody travels nowadays, of course, +and there is nothing really remarkable in finding a man in America +whom you had supposed to be in Europe: but nevertheless she was +conscious of a dream-like sensation, as though the clock had been +turned back and a chapter of her life reopened which she had thought +closed for ever.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Mr. +Carmyle!” she cried.</p> + +<p class="normal">If +Sally had been constantly in Bruce Carmyle’s thoughts since +they had parted on the Paris express, Mr. Carmyle had been very +little in Sally’s—so little, indeed, that she had had to +search her memory for a moment before she identified him.</p> + +<p class="normal">“We’re +always meeting on trains, aren’t we?” she went on, her +composure returning. “I never expected to see you in America.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +came over.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +was tempted to reply that she gathered that, but a sudden +embarrassment curbed her tongue. She had just remembered that at +their last meeting she had been abominably rude to this man. She was +never rude to anyone, without subsequent remorse. She contented +herself with a tame “Yes.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes,” +said Mr. Carmyle, “it is a good many years since I have taken a +real holiday. My doctor seemed to think I was a trifle run down. It +seemed a good opportunity to visit America. Everybody,” said +Mr. Carmyle oracularly, endeavouring, as he had often done since his +ship had left England, to persuade himself that his object in making +the trip had not been merely to renew his acquaintance with Sally, +“everybody ought to visit America at least once. It is part of +one’s education.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +what are your impressions of our glorious country?” said Sally +rallying.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Carmyle seemed glad of the opportunity of lecturing on an impersonal +subject. He, too, though his face had shown no trace of it, had been +embarrassed in the opening stages of the conversation. The sound of +his voice restored him.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +have been visiting Chicago,” he said after a brief travelogue.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“A +wonderful city.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ve +never seen it. I’ve come from Detroit.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +I heard you were in Detroit.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally’s +eyes opened.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +heard I was in Detroit? Good gracious! How?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I—ah—called +at your New York address and made inquiries,” said Mr. Carmyle +a little awkwardly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +how did you know where I lived?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“My +cousin—er—Lancelot told me.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +was silent for a moment. She had much the same feeling that comes to +the man in the detective story who realizes that he is being +shadowed. Even if this almost complete stranger had not actually +come to America in direct pursuit of her, there was no disguising the +fact that he evidently found her an object of considerable interest. +It was a compliment, but Sally was not at all sure that she liked it. + Bruce Carmyle meant nothing to her, and it was rather disturbing to +find that she was apparently of great importance to him. She seized +on the mention of Ginger as a lever for diverting the conversation +from its present too intimate course.</p> + +<p class="normal">“How +is Mr. Kemp?” she asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Carmyle’s dark face seemed to become a trifle darker.</p> + +<p class="normal">“We +have had no news of him,” he said shortly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“No +news? How do you mean? You speak as though he had disappeared.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“He +has disappeared!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Good +heavens! When?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Shortly +after I saw you last.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Disappeared!”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Carmyle frowned. Sally, watching him, found her antipathy stirring +again. There was something about this man which she had disliked +instinctively from the first, a sort of hardness.</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +where has he gone to?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t know.” Mr. Carmyle frowned again. The subject of +Ginger was plainly a sore one. “And I don’t want to +know,” he went on heatedly, a dull flush rising in the cheeks +which Sally was sure he had to shave twice a day. “I don’t +care to know. The Family have washed their hands of him. For the +future he may look after himself as best he can. I believe he is off +his head.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally’s +rebellious temper was well ablaze now, but she fought it down. She +would dearly have loved to give battle to Mr. Carmyle—it was +odd, she felt, how she seemed to have constituted herself Ginger’s +champion and protector—but she perceived that, if she wished, +as she did, to hear more of her red-headed friend, he must be +humoured and conciliated.</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +what happened? What was all the trouble about?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Carmyle’s eyebrows met.</p> + +<p class="normal">“He—insulted +his uncle. His uncle Donald. He insulted him—grossly. The +one man in the world he should have made a point of—er—”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Keeping +in with?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes. + His future depended upon him.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +what did he do?” cried Sally, trying hard to keep a thoroughly +reprehensible joy out of her voice.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +have heard no details. My uncle is reticent as to what actually took +place. He invited Lancelot to dinner to discuss his plans, and it +appears that Lancelot—defied him. Defied him! He was rude and +insulting. My uncle refuses to have anything more to do with him. +Apparently the young fool managed to win some money at the tables at +Roville, and this seems to have turned his head completely. My uncle +insists that he is mad. I agree with him. Since the night of that +dinner nothing has been heard of Lancelot.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Carmyle broke off to brood once more, and before Sally could speak +the impressive bulk of Fillmore loomed up in the aisle beside them. +Explanations seemed to Fillmore to be in order. He cast a +questioning glance at the mysterious stranger, who, in addition to +being in conversation with his sister, had collared his seat.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +hullo, Fill,” said Sally. “Fillmore, this is Mr. +Carmyle. We met abroad. My brother Fillmore, Mr. Carmyle.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Proper +introduction having been thus effected, Fillmore approved of Mr. +Carmyle. His air of being someone in particular appealed to him.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Strange +you meeting again like this,” he said affably.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +porter, who had been making up berths along the car, was now hovering +expectantly in the offing.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +two had better go into the smoking room,” suggested Sally. +“I’m going to bed.”</p> + +<p class="normal">She +wanted to be alone, to think. Mr. Carmyle’s tale of a roused +and revolting Ginger had stirred her.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +two men went off to the smoking-room, and Sally found an empty seat +and sat down to wait for her berth to be made up. She was aglow with +a curious exhilaration. So Ginger had taken her advice! Excellent +Ginger! She felt proud of him. She also had that feeling of +complacency, amounting almost to sinful pride, which comes to those +who give advice and find it acted upon. She had the emotions of a +creator. After all, had she not created this new Ginger? It was she +who had stirred him up. It was she who had unleashed him. She had +changed him from a meek dependent of the Family to a ravening +creature, who went about the place insulting uncles.</p> + +<p class="normal">It +was a feat, there was no denying it. It was something attempted, +something done: and by all the rules laid down by the poet it should, +therefore, have earned a night’s repose. Yet, Sally, jolted by +the train, which towards the small hours seemed to be trying out some +new buck-and-wing steps of its own invention, slept ill, and +presently, as she lay awake, there came to her bedside the Spectre of +Doubt, gaunt and questioning. Had she, after all, wrought so well? +Had she been wise in tampering with this young man’s life?</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +about it?” said the Spectre of Doubt.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">3</h3> + +<p class="normal">Daylight +brought no comforting answer to the question. Breakfast failed to +manufacture an easy mind. Sally got off the train, at the Grand +Central station in a state of remorseful concern. She declined the +offer of Mr. Carmyle to drive her to the boarding-house, and started +to walk there, hoping that the crisp morning air would effect a cure.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +wondered now how she could ever have looked with approval on her rash +act. She wondered what demon of interference and meddling had +possessed her, to make her blunder into people’s lives, +upsetting them. She wondered that she was allowed to go around +loose. She was nothing more nor less than a menace to society. Here +was an estimable young man, obviously the sort of young man who would +always have to be assisted through life by his relatives, and she had +deliberately egged him on to wreck his prospects. She blushed hotly +as she remembered that mad wireless she had sent him from the boat.</p> + +<p class="normal">Miserable +Ginger! She pictured him, his little stock of money gone, wandering +foot-sore about London, seeking in vain for work; forcing himself to +call on Uncle Donald; being thrown down the front steps by haughty +footmen; sleeping on the Embankment; gazing into the darkwaters of +the Thames with the stare of hopelessness; climbing to the parapet +and... +</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ugh!” +said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +had arrived at the door of the boarding-house, and Mrs. Meecher was +regarding her with welcoming eyes, little knowing that to all +practical intents and purposes she had slain in his prime a +red-headed young man of amiable manners and—when not +ill-advised by meddling, muddling females—of excellent +behaviour.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mrs. +Meecher was friendly and garrulous. <i>Variety,</i> the journal +which, next to the dog Toto, was the thing she loved best in the +world, had informed her on the Friday morning that Mr. Foster’s +play had got over big in Detroit, and that Miss Doland had made every +kind of hit. It was not often that the old <i>alumni of</i> the +boarding-house forced their way after this fashion into the Hall of +Fame, and, according to Mrs. Meecher, the establishment was ringing +with the news. That blue ribbon round Toto’s neck was worn in +honour of the triumph. There was also, though you could not see it, +a chicken dinner in Toto’s interior, by way of further +celebration.</p> + +<p class="normal">And +was it true that Mr. Fillmore had bought the piece? A great man, was +Mrs. Meecher’s verdict. Mr. Faucitt had always said so... +</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +how is Mr. Faucitt?” Sally asked, reproaching herself for +having allowed the pressure of other matters to drive all thoughts of +her late patient from her mind.</p> + +<p class="normal">“He’s +gone,” said Mrs. Meecher with such relish that to Sally, in her +morbid condition, the words had only one meaning. She turned white +and clutched at the banisters.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Gone!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“To +England,” added Mrs. Meecher. Sally was vastly relieved.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +I thought you meant...” +</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh +no, not that.” Mrs. Meecher sighed, for she had been a little +disappointed in the old gentleman, who started out as such a +promising invalid, only to fall away into the dullness of robust +health once more. “He’s <i>well</i> enough. I never +seen anybody better. You’d think,” said Mrs. Meecher, +bearing bearing up with difficulty under her grievance, “you’d +think this here new Spanish influenza was a sort of a tonic or +somep’n, the way he looks now. Of course,” she added, +trying to find justification for a respected lodger, “he’s +had good news. His brother’s dead.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Not, +I don’t mean, that that was good news, far from it, though, +come to think of it, all flesh is as grass and we all got to be +prepared for somep’n of the sort breaking loose…but it +seems this here new brother of his—I didn’t know he’d +a brother, and I don’t suppose <i>you</i> knew he had a +brother. Men are secretive, ain’t they!—this brother of +his has left him a parcel of money, and Mr. Faucitt he had to get on +the Wednesday boat quick as he could and go right over to the other +side to look after things. Wind up the estate, I believe they call +it. Left in a awful hurry, he did. Sent his love to you and said +he’d write. Funny him having a brother, now, wasn’t it? +Not,” said Mrs. Meecher, at heart a reasonable woman, “that +folks <i>don’t</i> have brothers. I got two myself, one in +Portland, Oregon, and the other goodness knows where he is. But what +I’m trying to say...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +disengaged herself, and went up to her room. For a brief while the +excitement which comes of hearing good news about those of whom we +are fond acted as a stimulant, and she felt almost cheerful. Dear +old Mr. Faucitt. She was sorry for his brother, of course, though +she had never had the pleasure of his acquaintance and had only just +heard that he had ever existed; but it was nice to think that her old +friend’s remaining years would be years of affluence.</p> + +<p class="normal">Presently, +however, she found her thoughts wandering back into their melancholy +groove. She threw herself wearily on the bed. She was tired after +her bad night.</p> + +<p class="normal">But +she could not sleep. Remorse kept her awake. Besides, she could +hear Mrs. Meecher prowling disturbingly about the house, apparently +in search of someone, her progress indicated by creaking boards and +the strenuous yapping of Toto.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +turned restlessly, and, having turned remained for a long instant +transfixed and rigid. She had seen something, and what she had seen +was enough to surprise any girl in the privacy of her bedroom. From +underneath the bed there peeped coyly forth an undeniably masculine +shoe and six inches of a grey trouser-leg.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +bounded to the floor. She was a girl of courage, and she meant to +probe this matter thoroughly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +are you doing under my bed?”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +question was a reasonable one, and evidently seemed to the intruder +to deserve an answer. There was a muffled sneeze, and he began to +crawl out.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +shoe came first. Then the legs. Then a sturdy body in a dusty coat. + And finally there flashed on Sally’s fascinated gaze a head of +so nearly the maximum redness that it could only belong to one person +in the world.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ginger!” + +</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Lancelot Kemp, on all fours, blinked up at her.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +hullo!” he said.</p> + + +<h3 class="chap">CHAPTER IX</h3> + +<h3 class="titl">GINGER BECOMES A RIGHT-HAND MAN</h3> + + +<p class="normal">It +was not till she saw him actually standing there before her with his +hair rumpled and a large smut on the tip of his nose, that Sally +really understood how profoundly troubled she had been about this +young man, and how vivid had been that vision of him bobbing about on +the waters of the Thames, a cold and unappreciated corpse. She was a +girl of keen imagination, and she had allowed her imagination to riot +unchecked. Astonishment, therefore, at the extraordinary fact of his +being there was for the moment thrust aside by relief. Never before +in her life had she experienced such an overwhelming rush of +exhilaration. She flung herself into a chair and burst into a +screech of laughter which even to her own ears sounded strange. It +struck Ginger as hysterical.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +say, you know!” said Ginger, as the merriment showed no signs +of abating. Ginger was concerned. Nasty shock for a girl, finding +blighters under her bed.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +sat up, gurgling, and wiped her eyes.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +I <i>am</i> glad to see you,” she gasped.</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +really?” said Ginger, gratified. “That’s fine.” +It occurred to him that some sort of apology would be a graceful act. + “I say, you know, awfully sorry. About barging in here, I +mean. Never dreamed it was your room. Unoccupied, I thought.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Don’t +mention it. I ought not to have disturbed you. You were having a +nice sleep, of course. Do you always sleep on the floor?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +was like this...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Of +course, if you’re wearing it for ornament, as a sort of +beauty-spot,” said Sally, “all right. But in case you +don’t know, you’ve a smut on your nose.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +my aunt! Not really?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Now +would I deceive you on an important point like that?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do +you mind if I have a look in the glass?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Certainly, +if you can stand it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +moved hurriedly to the dressing-table.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’re +perfectly right,” he announced, applying his handkerchief.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +thought I was. I’m very quick at noticing things.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“My +hair’s a bit rumpled, too.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Very +much so.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +take my tis,” said Ginger, earnestly, “and never lie +about under beds. There’s nothing in it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“That +reminds me. You won’t be offended if I asked you something?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +no. Go ahead.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +rather an impertinent question. You may resent it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +no.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +then, what <i>were</i> you doing under my bed?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +under your bed?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes. + Under my bed. This. It’s a bed, you know. Mine. My bed. +You were under it. Why? Or putting it another way, why were you +under my bed?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +was hiding.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Playing +hide-and-seek? That explains it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Mrs. +What’s-her-name—Beecher—Meecher—was after me.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +shook her head disapprovingly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +mustn’t encourage Mrs. Meecher in these childish pastimes. It +unsettles her.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +passed an agitated hand over his forehead.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +like this...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +hate to keep criticizing your appearance,” said Sally, “and +personally I like it; but, when you clutched your brow just then, you +put about a pound of dust on it. Your hands are probably grubby.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +inspected them.</p> + +<p class="normal">“They +are!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why +not make a really good job of it and have a wash?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do +you mind?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’d +prefer it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Thanks +awfully. I mean to say it’s your basin, you know, and all +that. What I mean is, seem to be making myself pretty well at home.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +no.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Touching +the matter of soap...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Use +mine. We Americans are famous for our hospitality.” +</p> + +<p class="normal">“Thanks +awfully.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +towel is on your right.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Thanks +awfully.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +I’ve a clothes brush in my bag.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Thanks +awfully.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Splashing +followed like a sea-lion taking a dip. “Now, then,” said +Sally, “why were you hiding from Mrs. Meecher?”</p> + +<p class="normal">A +careworn, almost hunted look came into Ginger’s face. “I +say, you know, that woman is rather by way of being one of the lads, +what! Scares <i>me!</i> Word was brought that she was on the prowl, +so it seemed to me a judicious move to take cover till she sort of +blew over. If she’d found me, she’d have made me take +that dog of hers for a walk.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Toto?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Toto. + You know,” said Ginger, with a strong sense of injury, “no +dog’s got a right to be a dog like that. I don’t suppose +there’s anyone keener on dogs than I am, but a thing like a +woolly rat.” He shuddered slightly. “Well, one hates to +be seen about with it in the public streets.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why +couldn’t you have refused in a firm but gentlemanly manner to +take Toto out?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ah! +There you rather touch the spot. You see, the fact of the matter is, +I’m a bit behind with the rent, and that makes it rather hard +to take what you might call a firm stand.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +how can you be behind with the rent? I only left here the Saturday +before last and you weren’t in the place then. You can’t +have been here more than a week.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ve +been here just a week. That’s the week I’m behind with.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +why? You were a millionaire when I left you at Roville.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +the fact of the matter is, I went back to the tables that night and +lost a goodish bit of what I’d won. And, somehow or another, +when I got to America, the stuff seemed to slip away.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +made you come to America at all?” said Sally, asking the +question which, she felt, any sensible person would have asked at the +opening of the conversation.</p> + +<p class="normal">One +of his familiar blushes raced over Ginger’s face. “Oh, I +thought I would. Land of opportunity, you know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Have +you managed to find any of the opportunities yet?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +I have got a job of sorts, I’m a waiter at a rummy little place +on Second Avenue. The salary isn’t big, but I’d have +wangled enough out of it to pay last week’s rent, only they +docked me a goodish bit for breaking plates and what not. The fact +is, I’m making rather a hash of it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +Ginger! You oughtn’t to be a waiter!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“That’s +what the boss seems to think.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +mean, you ought to be doing something ever so much better.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +what? You’ve no notion how well all these blighters here seem +to be able to get along without my help. I’ve tramped all over +the place, offering my services, but they all say they’ll try +to carry on as they are.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +reflected.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +know!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What?” + +</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ll +make Fillmore give you a job. I wonder I didn’t think of it +before.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Fillmore?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“My +brother. Yes, he’ll be able to use you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +as?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +considered.</p> + +<p class="normal">“As +a—as a—oh, as his right-hand man.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Does +he want a right-hand man?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Sure +to. He’s a young fellow trying to get along. Sure to want a +right-hand man.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“‘M +yes,” said Ginger reflectively. “Of course, I’ve +never been a right-hand man, you know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +you’d pick it up. I’ll take you round to him now. He’s +staying at the Astor.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“There’s +just one thing,” said Ginger.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What’s +that?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +might make a hash of it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Heavens, +Ginger! There must be something in this world that you wouldn’t +make a hash of. Don’t stand arguing any longer. Are you dry? +and clean? Very well, then. Let’s be off.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Right +ho.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +took a step towards the door, then paused, rigid, with one leg in the +air, as though some spell had been cast upon him. From the passage +outside there had sounded a shrill yapping. Ginger looked at Sally. +Then he looked—longingly—at the bed.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Don’t +be such a coward,” said Sally, severely.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +but...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“How +much do you owe Mrs. Meecher?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Round +about twelve dollars, I think it is.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ll +pay her.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +flushed awkwardly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +I’m hanged if you will! I mean,” he stammered, “it’s +frightfully good of you and all that, and I can’t tell you how +grateful I am, but honestly, I couldn’t...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +did not press the point. She liked him the better for a rugged +independence, which in the days of his impecuniousness her brother +Fillmore had never dreamed of exhibiting.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Very +well,” she said. “Have it your own way. Proud. That’s +me all over, Mabel. Ginger!” She broke off sharply. “Pull +yourself together. Where is your manly spirit? I’d be ashamed +to be such a coward.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Awfully +sorry, but, honestly, that woolly dog...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Never +mind the dog. I’ll see you through.”</p> + +<p class="normal">They +came out into the passage almost on top of Toto, who was stalking +phantom rats. Mrs. Meecher was manoeuvring in the background. Her +face lit up grimly at the sight of Ginger.</p> + +<p class="normal">“<i>Mister +Kemp!</i> I been looking for you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +intervened brightly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +Mrs. Meecher,” she said, shepherding her young charge through +the danger zone, “I was so surprised to meet Mr. Kemp here. He +is a great friend of mine. We met in France. We’re going off +now to have a long talk about old times, and then I’m taking +him to see my brother...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Toto...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Dear +little thing! You ought to take him for a walk,” said Sally. +“It’s a lovely day. Mr. Kemp was saying just now that he +would have liked to take him, but we’re rather in a hurry and +shall probably have to get into a taxi. You’ve no idea how +busy my brother is just now. If we’re late, he’ll never +forgive us.”</p> + +<p class="normal">She +passed on down the stairs, leaving Mrs. Meecher dissatisfied but +irresolute. There was something about Sally which even in her +pre-wealthy days had always baffled Mrs. Meecher and cramped her +style, and now that she was rich and independent she inspired in the +chatelaine of the boarding-house an emotion which was almost awe. +The front door had closed before Mrs. Meecher had collected her +faculties; and Ginger, pausing on the sidewalk, drew a long breath. +</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +know, you’re wonderful!” he said, regarding Sally with +unconcealed admiration.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +accepted the compliment composedly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Now +we’ll go and hunt up Fillmore,” she said. “But +there’s no need to hurry, of course, really. We’ll go +for a walk first, and then call at the Astor and make him give us +lunch. I want to hear all about you. I’ve heard something +already. I met your cousin, Mr. Carmyle. He was on the train coming +from Detroit. Did you know that he was in America?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +I’ve—er—rather lost touch with the Family.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“So +I gathered from Mr. Carmyle. And I feel hideously responsible. It +was all through me that all this happened.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +no.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Of +course it was. I made you what you are to-day—I hope I’m +satisfied—I dragged and dragged you down until the soul within +you died, so to speak. I know perfectly well that you wouldn’t +have dreamed of savaging the Family as you seem to have done if it +hadn’t been for what I said to you at Roville. Ginger, tell +me, what <i>did</i> happen? I’m dying to know. Mr. Carmyle +said you insulted your uncle!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Donald. +Yes, we did have a bit of a scrap, as a matter of fact. He made me +go out to dinner with him and we—er—sort of disagreed. +To start with, he wanted me to apologize to old Scrymgeour, and I +rather gave it a miss.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Noble +fellow!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Scrymgeour?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +silly! You.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +ah!” Ginger blushed. “And then there was all that about +the soup, you know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“How +do you mean, ‘all that about the soup’? What about the +soup? What soup?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +things sort of hotted up a bit when the soup arrived.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t understand.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +mean, the trouble seemed to start, as it were, when the waiter had +finished ladling out the mulligatawny. Thick soup, you know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +know mulligatawny is a thick soup. Yes?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +my old uncle—I’m not blaming him, don’t you +know—more his misfortune than his fault—I can see that +now—but he’s got a heavy moustache. Like a walrus, +rather, and he’s a bit apt to inhale the stuff through it. And +I—well, I asked him not to. It was just a suggestion, you +know. He cut up fairly rough, and by the time the fish came round we +were more or less down on the mat chewing holes in one another. My +fault, probably. I wasn’t feeling particularly well-disposed +towards the Family that night. I’d just had a talk with +Bruce—my cousin, you know—in Piccadilly, and that had +rather got the wind up me. Bruce always seems to get on my nerves a +bit somehow and—Uncle Donald asking me to dinner and all that. +By the way, did you get the books?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +books?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Bruce +said he wanted to send you some books. That was why I gave him your +address.” Sally stared. +</p> + +<p class="normal">“He +never sent me any books.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +he said he was going to, and I had to tell him where to send them.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +walked on, a little thoughtfully. She was not a vain girl, but it +was impossible not to perceive in the light of this fresh evidence +that Mr. Carmyle had made a journey of three thousand miles with the +sole object of renewing his acquaintance with her. It did not +matter, of course, but it was vaguely disturbing. No girl cares to +be dogged by a man she rather dislikes.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Go +on telling me about your uncle,” she said. +</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +there’s not much more to tell. I’d happened to get that +wireless of yours just before I started out to dinner with him, and I +was more or less feeling that I wasn’t going to stand any rot +from the Family. I’d got to the fish course, hadn’t I? +Well, we managed to get through that somehow, but we didn’t +survive the fillet steak. One thing seemed to lead to another, and +the show sort of bust up. He called me a good many things, and I got +a bit fed-up, and finally I told him I hadn’t any more use for +the Family and was going to start out on my own. And—well, I +did, don’t you know. And here I am.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +listened to this saga breathlessly. More than ever did she feel +responsible for her young protégé, and any faint qualms +which she had entertained as to the wisdom of transferring +practically the whole of her patrimony to the care of so erratic a +financier as her brother vanished. It was her plain duty to see that +Ginger was started well in the race of life, and Fillmore was going +to come in uncommonly handy.</p> + +<p class="normal">“We’ll +go to the Astor now,” she said, “and I’ll introduce +you to Fillmore. He’s a theatrical manager and he’s sure +to have something for you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +awfully good of you to bother about me.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ginger,” +said Sally, “I regard you as a grandson. Hail that cab, will +you?”</p> + + +<h3 class="chap">CHAPTER X</h3> + +<h3 class="titl">SALLY IN THE SHADOWS</h3> + +<h3 class="sect">1</h3> + +<p class="normal">It +seemed to Sally in the weeks that followed her reunion with Ginger +Kemp that a sort of golden age had set in. On all the frontiers of +her little kingdom there was peace and prosperity, and she woke each +morning in a world so neatly smoothed and ironed out that the most +captious pessimist could hardly have found anything in it to +criticize.</p> + +<p class="normal">True, +Gerald was still a thousand miles away. Going to Chicago to +superintend the opening of “The Primrose Way”; for +Fillmore had acceded to his friend Ike’s suggestion in the +matter of producing it first in Chicago, and he had been called in by +a distracted manager to revise the work of a brother dramatist, whose +comedy was in difficulties at one of the theatres in that city; and +this meant he would have to remain on the spot for some time to come. + It was disappointing, for Sally had been looking forward to having +him back in New York in a few days; but she refused to allow herself +to be depressed. Life as a whole was much too satisfactory for that. + Life indeed, in every other respect, seemed perfect. Fillmore was +going strong; Ginger was off her conscience; she had found an +apartment; her new hat suited her; and “The Primrose Way” +was a tremendous success. Chicago, it appeared from Fillmore’s +account, was paying little attention to anything except “The +Primrose Way.” National problems had ceased to interest the +citizens. Local problems left them cold. Their minds were riveted +to the exclusion of all else on the problem of how to secure seats. +The production of the piece, according to Fillmore, had been the most +terrific experience that had come to stir Chicago since the great +fire.</p> + +<p class="normal">Of +all these satisfactory happenings, the most satisfactory, to Sally’s +thinking, was the fact that the problem of Ginger’s future had +been solved. Ginger had entered the service of the Fillmore Nicholas +Theatrical Enterprises Ltd. (Managing Director, Fillmore +Nicholas)—Fillmore would have made the title longer, only that +was all that would go on the brass plate—and was to be found +daily in the outer office, his duties consisting mainly, it seemed, +in reading the evening papers. What exactly he was, even Ginger +hardly knew. Sometimes he felt like the man at the wheel, sometimes +like a glorified office boy, and not so very glorified at that. For +the most part he had to prevent the mob rushing and getting at +Fillmore, who sat in semi-regal state in the inner office pondering +great schemes.</p> + +<p class="normal">But, +though there might be an occasional passing uncertainty in Ginger’s +mind as to just what he was supposed to be doing in exchange for the +fifty dollars he drew every Friday, there was nothing uncertain about +his gratitude to Sally for having pulled the strings and enabled him +to do it. He tried to thank her every time they met, and nowadays +they were meeting frequently; for Ginger was helping her to furnish +her new apartment. In this task, he spared no efforts. He said that +it kept him in condition.</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +what I mean to say is,” said Ginger, pausing in the act of +carrying a massive easy chair to the third spot which Sally had +selected in the last ten minutes, “if I didn’t sweat +about a bit and help you after the way you got me that job...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ginger, +desist,” said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +but honestly...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +you don’t stop it, I’ll make you move that chair into the +next room.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Shall +I?” Ginger rubbed his blistered hands and took a new grip. +“Anything you say.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Silly! +Of course not. The only other rooms are my bedroom, the bathroom and +the kitchen. What on earth would I want a great lumbering chair in +them for? All the same, I believe the first we chose was the best.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Back +she goes, then, what?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +reflected frowningly. This business of setting up house was causing +her much thought.</p> + +<p class="normal">“No,” +she decided. “By the window is better.” She looked at +him remorsefully. “I’m giving you a lot of trouble.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Trouble!” +Ginger, accompanied by a chair, staggered across the room. “The +way I look at it is this.” He wiped a bead of perspiration from +his freckled forehead. “You got me that job, and...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Stop!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Right +ho... Still, you did, you know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +sat down in the armchair and stretched herself. Watching Ginger work +had given her a vicarious fatigue. She surveyed the room proudly. +It was certainly beginning to look cosy. The pictures were up, the +carpet down, the furniture very neatly in order. For almost the +first time in her life she had the restful sensation of being at +home. She had always longed, during the past three years of +boarding-house existence, for a settled abode, a place where she +could lock the door on herself and be alone. The apartment was +small, but it was undeniably a haven. She looked about her and could +see no flaw in it... except... She had a sudden sense of something +missing.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Hullo!” +she said. “Where’s that photograph of me? I’m sure +I put it on the mantelpiece yesterday.”</p> + +<p class="normal">His +exertions seemed to have brought the blood to Ginger’s face. +He was a rich red. He inspected the mantelpiece narrowly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“No. + No photograph here.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +know there isn’t. But it was there yesterday. Or was it? I +know I meant to put it there. Perhaps I forgot. It’s the most +beautiful thing you ever saw. Not a bit like me; but what of that? +They touch ‘em up in the dark-room, you know. I value it +because it looks the way I should like to look if I could.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ve +never had a beautiful photograph taken of myself,” said Ginger, +solemnly, with gentle regret.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Cheer +up!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +I don’t <i>mind. </i>I only mentioned...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ginger,” +said Sally, “pardon my interrupting your remarks, which I know +are valuable, but this chair is—not—right! It ought to +be where it was at the beginning. Could you give your imitation of a +pack-mule just once more? And after that I’ll make you some +tea. <i>If</i> there’s any tea—or milk—or cups.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“There +are cups all right. I know, because I smashed two the day before +yesterday. I’ll nip round the corner for some milk, shall I?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +please nip. All this hard work has taken it out of me terribly.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Over +the tea-table Sally became inquisitive.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +I can’t understand about this job of yours. Ginger—which +as you are just about to observe, I was noble enough to secure for +you—is the amount of leisure that seems to go with it. How is +it that you are able to spend your valuable time—Fillmore’s +valuable time, rather—juggling with my furniture every day?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +I can usually get off.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +oughtn’t you to be at your post doing—whatever it is you +do? What <i>do</i> you do?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +stirred his tea thoughtfully and gave his mind to the question.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +I sort of mess about, you know.” He pondered. I +interview divers blighters and tell ‘em your brother is out and +take their names and addresses and... oh, all that sort of thing.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Does +Fillmore consult you much?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“He +lets me read some of the plays that are sent in. Awful tosh most of +them. Sometimes he sends me off to a vaudeville house of an +evening.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“As +a treat?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“To +see some special act, you know. To report on it. In case he might +want to use it for this revue of his.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Which +revue?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Didn’t +you know he was going to put on a revue? Oh, rather. A whacking big +affair. Going to cut out the Follies and all that sort of thing.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But—my +goodness!” Sally was alarmed. It was just like Fillmore, she +felt, to go branching out into these expensive schemes when he ought +to be moving warily and trying to consolidate the small success he +had had. All his life he had thought in millions where the prudent +man would have been content with hundreds. An inexhaustible fount of +optimism bubbled eternally within him. “That’s rather +ambitious,” she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes. + Ambitious sort of cove, your brother. Quite the Napoleon.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +shall have to talk to him,” said Sally decidedly. She was +annoyed with Fillmore. Everything had been going so beautifully, +with everybody peaceful and happy and prosperous and no anxiety +anywhere, till he had spoiled things. Now she would have to start +worrying again.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Of +course,” argued Ginger, “there’s money in revues. +Over in London fellows make pots out of them.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +shook her head.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +won’t do,” she said. “And I’ll tell you +another thing that won’t do. This armchair. Of <i>course</i> +it ought to be over by the window. You can see that yourself, can’t +you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Absolutely!” +said Ginger, patiently preparing for action once more.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">2</h3> + +<p class="normal">Sally’s +anxiety with regard to her ebullient brother was not lessened by the +receipt shortly afterwards of a telegram from Miss Winch in Chicago.</p> + +<p class="normal"><i>Have you been feeding Fillmore meat?</i></p> + +<p class="left">the +telegram ran: and, while Sally could not have claimed that she +completely understood it, there was a sinister suggestion about the +message which decided her to wait no longer before making +investigations. She tore herself away from the joys of furnishing +and went round to the headquarters of the Fillmore Nicholas +Theatrical Enterprises Ltd. (Managing Director, Fillmore Nicholas) +without delay.</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger, +she discovered on arrival, was absent from his customary post, his +place in the outer office being taken by a lad of tender years and +pimply exterior, who thawed and cast off a proud reserve on hearing +Sally’s name, and told her to walk right in. Sally walked +right in, and found Fillmore with his feet on an untidy desk, +studying what appeared to be costume-designs.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ah, +Sally!” he said in the distrait, tired voice which speaks of +vast preoccupations. Prosperity was still putting in its silent, +deadly work on the Hope of the American Theatre. What, even at as +late an epoch as the return from Detroit, had been merely a smooth +fullness around the angle of the jaw was now frankly and without +disguise a double chin. He was wearing a new waistcoat and it was +unbuttoned. “I am rather busy,” he went on. “Always +glad to see you, but I <i>am</i> rather busy. I have a hundred +things to attend to.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +attend to me. That’ll only make a hundred and one. Fill, +what’s all this I hear about a revue?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +looked as like a small boy caught in the act of stealing jam as it is +possible for a great theatrical manager to look. He had been +wondering in his darker moments what Sally would say about that +project when she heard of it, and he had hoped that she would not +hear of it until all the preparations were so complete that +interference would be impossible. He was extremely fond of Sally, +but there was, he knew, a lamentable vein of caution in her make-up +which might lead her to criticize. And how can your man of affairs +carry on if women are buzzing round criticizing all the time? He +picked up a pen and put it down; buttoned his waistcoat and +unbuttoned it; and scratched his ear with one of the costume-designs.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh +yes, the revue!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +no good saying ‘Oh yes’! You know perfectly well it’s +a crazy idea.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Really... +these business matters... this interference...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t want to run your affairs for you, Fill, but that money of +mine does make me a sort of partner, I suppose, and I think I have a +right to raise a loud yell of agony when I see you risking it on +a...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Pardon +me,” said Fillmore loftily, looking happier. “Let me +explain. Women never understand business matters. Your money is +tied up exclusively in ‘The Primrose Way,’ which, as you +know, is a tremendous success. You have nothing whatever to worry +about as regards any new production I may make.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +not worrying about the money. I’m worrying about you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">A +tolerant smile played about the lower slopes of Fillmore’s +face.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Don’t +be alarmed about <i>me. </i>I’m all right.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +aren’t all right. You’ve no business, when you’ve +only just got started as a manager, to be rushing into an enormous +production like this. You can’t afford it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“My +dear child, as I said before, women cannot understand these things. +A man in my position can always command money for a new venture.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do +you mean to say you have found somebody silly enough to put up +money?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Certainly. + I don’t know that there is any secret about it. Your friend, +Mr. Carmyle, has taken an interest in some of my forthcoming +productions.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What!” +Sally had been disturbed before, but she was aghast now.</p> + +<p class="normal">This +was something she had never anticipated. Bruce Carmyle seemed to be +creeping into her life like an advancing tide. There appeared to be +no eluding him. Wherever she turned, there he was, and she could do +nothing but rage impotently. The situation was becoming impossible.</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +misinterpreted the note of dismay in her voice.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +quite all right,” he assured her. “He’s a very +rich man. Large private means, besides his big income. Even if +anything goes wrong...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +isn’t that. It’s...”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +hopelessness of explaining to Fillmore stopped Sally. And while she +was chafing at this new complication which had come to upset the +orderly routine of her life there was an outburst of voices in the +other office. Ginger’s understudy seemed to be endeavouring to +convince somebody that the Big Chief was engaged and not to be +intruded upon. In this he was unsuccessful, for the door opened +tempestuously and Miss Winch sailed in.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Fillmore, +you poor nut,” said Miss Winch, for though she might wrap up +her meaning somewhat obscurely in her telegraphic communications, +when it came to the spoken word she was directness itself, “stop +picking straws in your hair and listen to me. You’re dippy!”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +last time Sally had seen Fillmore’s fiancée, she had +been impressed by her imperturbable calm. Miss Winch, in Detroit, +had seemed a girl whom nothing could ruffle. That she had lapsed now +from this serene placidity, struck Sally as ominous. Slightly though +she knew her, she felt that it could be no ordinary happening that +had so animated her sister-in-law-to-be.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ah! +Here you are!” said Fillmore. He had started to his feet +indignantly at the opening of the door, like a lion bearded in its +den, but calm had returned when he saw who the intruder was.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +here I am!” Miss Winch dropped despairingly into a +swivel-chair, and endeavoured to restore herself with a stick of +chewing-gum. “Fillmore, darling, you’re the sweetest +thing on earth, and I love you, but on present form you could just +walk straight into Bloomingdale and they’d give you the royal +suite.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“My +dear girl...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +do <i>you</i> think?” demanded Miss Winch, turning to Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ve +just been telling him,” said Sally, welcoming this ally, “I +think it’s absurd at this stage of things for him to put on an +enormous revue...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Revue?” +Miss Winch stopped in the act of gnawing her gum. “What +revue?” She flung up her arms. “I shall have to swallow +this gum,” she said. “You can’t chew with your +head going round. Are you putting on a revue <i>too?</i>”</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +was buttoning and unbuttoning his waistcoat. He had a hounded look.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Certainly, +certainly,” he replied in a tone of some feverishness. “I +wish you girls would leave me to manage...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Dippy!” +said Miss Winch once more. “Telegraphic address: Tea-Pot, +Matteawan.” She swivelled round to Sally again. “Say, +listen! This boy must be stopped. We must form a gang in his best +interests and get him put away. What do you think he proposes doing? +I’ll give you three guesses. Oh, what’s the use? You’d +never hit it. This poor wandering lad has got it all fixed up to +star me—<i>me—</i>in a new show!”</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +removed a hand from his waistcoat buttons and waved it protestingly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +have used my own judgment...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +<i>sir!”</i> proceeded Miss Winch, riding over the +interruption. “That’s what he’s planning to spring +on an unsuspicious public. I’m sitting peacefully in my room +at the hotel in Chicago, pronging a few cents’ worth of +scrambled eggs and reading the morning paper, when the telephone +rings. Gentleman below would like to see me. Oh, ask him to wait. +Business of flinging on a few clothes. Down in elevator. Bright +sunrise effects in lobby.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +on earth do you mean?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +gentleman had a head of red hair which had to be seen to be +believed,” explained Miss Winch. “Lit up the lobby. +Management had switched off all the electrics for sake of economy. +An Englishman he was. Nice fellow. Named Kemp.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +is Ginger in Chicago?” said Sally. “I wondered why he +wasn’t on his little chair in the outer office.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +sent Kemp to Chicago,” said Fillmore, “to have a look at +the show. It is my policy, if I am unable to pay periodical visits +myself, to send a representative...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Save +it up for the long winter evenings,” advised Miss Winch, +cutting in on this statement of managerial tactics. “Mr. Kemp +may have been there to look at the show, but his chief reason for +coming was to tell me to beat it back to New York to enter into my +kingdom. Fillmore wanted me on the spot, he told me, so that I could +sit around in this office here, interviewing my supporting company. +Me! Can you or can you not,” inquired Miss Winch frankly, “tie +it?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well...” +Sally hesitated.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Don’t +say it! I know it just as well as you do. It’s too sad for +words.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +persist in underestimating your abilities, Gladys,” said +Fillmore reproachfully. “I have had a certain amount of +experience in theatrical matters—I have seen a good deal of +acting—and I assure you that as a character-actress you...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Miss +Winch rose swiftly from her seat, kissed Fillmore energetically, and +sat down again. She produced another stick of chewing-gum, then +shook her head and replaced it in her bag.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’re +a darling old thing to talk like that,” she said, “and I +hate to wake you out of your daydreams, but, honestly, Fillmore, +dear, do just step out of the padded cell for one moment and listen +to reason. I know exactly what has been passing in your poor +disordered bean. You took Elsa Doland out of a minor part and made +her a star overnight. She goes to Chicago, and the critics and +everybody else rave about her. As a matter of fact,” she said +to Sally with enthusiasm, for hers was an honest and generous nature, +“you can’t realize, not having seen her play there, what +an amazing hit she has made. She really is a sensation. Everybody +says she’s going to be the biggest thing on record. Very well, +then, what does Fillmore do? The poor fish claps his hand to his +forehead and cries ‘Gadzooks! An idea! I’ve done it +before, I’ll do it again. I’m the fellow who can make a +star out of anything.’ And he picks on <i>me!”</i></p> + +<p class="normal">“My +dear girl...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Now, +the flaw in the scheme is this. Elsa is a genius, and if he hadn’t +made her a star somebody else would have done. But little Gladys? +That’s something else again.” She turned to Sally. +“You’ve seen me in action, and let me tell you you’ve +seen me at my best. Give me a maid’s part, with a tray to +carry on in act one and a couple of ‘Yes, madam’s’ +in act two, and I’m <i>there!</i> Ellen Terry hasn’t +anything on me when it comes to saying ‘Yes, madam,’ and +I’m willing to back myself for gold, notes, or lima beans +against Sarah Bernhardt as a tray-carrier. But there I finish. That +lets me out. And anybody who thinks otherwise is going to lose a lot +of money. Between ourselves the only thing I can do really well is +to cook...” +</p> + +<p class="normal">“My +dear Gladys!” cried Fillmore revolted.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +a heaven-born cook, and I don’t mind notifying the world to +that effect. I can cook a chicken casserole so that you would leave +home and mother for it. Also my English pork-pies! One of these days +I’ll take an afternoon off and assemble one for you. You’d +be surprised! But acting—no. I can’t do it, and I don’t +want to do it. I only went on the stage for fun, and my idea of fun +isn’t to plough through a star part with all the critics waving +their axes in the front row, and me knowing all the time that it’s +taking money out of Fillmore’s bankroll that ought to be going +towards buying the little home with stationary wash-tubs... Well, +that’s that, Fillmore, old darling. I thought I’d just +mention it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +could not help being sorry for Fillmore. He was sitting with his +chin on his hands, staring moodily before him—Napoleon at +Elba. It was plain that this project of taking Miss Winch by the +scruff of the neck and hurling her to the heights had been very near +his heart.</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +that’s how you feel,” he said in a stricken voice, “there +is nothing more to say.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +yes there is. We will now talk about this revue of yours. It’s +off!”</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +bounded to his feet; he thumped the desk with a well-nourished fist. +A man can stand just so much.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +is not off! Great heavens! It’s too much! I will not put up +with this interference with my business concerns. I will not be tied +and hampered. Here am I, a man of broad vision and... and... broad +vision... I form my plans... my plans... I form them... I shape my +schemes... and what happens? A horde of girls flock into my private +office while I am endeavouring to concentrate... and concentrate... I +won’t stand it. Advice, yes. Interference, no. I... I... +I... and kindly remember that!”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +door closed with a bang. A fainter detonation announced the +whirlwind passage through the outer office. Footsteps died away down +the corridor.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +looked at Miss Winch, stunned. A roused and militant Fillmore was +new to her.</p> + +<p class="normal">Miss +Winch took out the stick of chewing-gum again and unwrapped it.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Isn’t +he cute!” she said. “I hope he doesn’t get the +soft kind,” she murmured, chewing reflectively.</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +soft kind.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“He’ll +be back soon with a box of candy,” explained Miss Winch, “and +he will get that sloshy, creamy sort, though I keep telling him I +like the other. Well, one thing’s certain. Fillmore’s +got it up his nose. He’s beginning to hop about and sing in +the sunlight. It’s going to be hard work to get that boy down +to earth again.” Miss Winch heaved a gentle sigh. “I +<i>should</i> like him to have enough left in the old stocking to pay +the first year’s rent when the wedding bells ring out.” +She bit meditatively on her chewing-gum. “Not,” she +said, “that it matters. I’d be just as happy in two +rooms and a kitchenette, so long as Fillmore was there. You’ve +no notion how dippy I am about him.” Her freckled face glowed. +“He grows on me like a darned drug. And the funny thing is +that I keep right on admiring him though I can see all the while that +he’s the most perfect chump. He <i>is</i> a chump, you know. +That’s what I love about him. That and the way his ears wiggle +when he gets excited. Chumps always make the best husbands. When +you marry. Sally, grab a chump. Tap his forehead first, and if it +rings solid, don’t hesitate. All the unhappy marriages come +from the husband having brains. What good are brains to a man? They +only unsettle him.” She broke off and scrutinized Sally +closely. “Say, what do you do with your skin?”</p> + +<p class="normal">She +spoke with solemn earnestness which made Sally laugh.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +do I do with my skin? I just carry it around with me.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well,” +said Miss Winch enviously, “I wish I could train my darned fool +of a complexion to get that way. Freckles are the devil. When I was +eight I had the finest collection in the Middle West, and I’ve +been adding to it right along. Some folks say lemon-juice’ll +cure ‘em. Mine lap up all I give ‘em and ask for more. +There’s only one way of getting rid of freckles, and that is to +saw the head off at the neck.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +why do you want to get rid of them?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why? +Because a sensitive girl, anxious to retain her future husband’s +love, doesn’t enjoy going about looking like something out of a +dime museum.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“How +absurd! Fillmore worships freckles.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Did +he tell you so?” asked Miss Winch eagerly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Not +in so many words, but you can see it in his eye.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +he certainly asked me to marry him, knowing all about them, I will +say that. And, what’s more, I don’t think feminine +loveliness means much to Fillmore, or he’d never have picked on +me. Still, it is calculated to give a girl a jar, you must admit, +when she picks up a magazine and reads an advertisement of a +face-cream beginning, ‘Your husband is growing cold to you. +Can you blame him? Have you really <i>tried</i> to cure those +unsightly blemishes?’ —meaning what I’ve got. +Still, I haven’t noticed Fillmore growing cold to me, so maybe +it’s all right.”</p> + +<p class="normal">It +was a subdued Sally who received Ginger when he called at her +apartment a few days later on his return from Chicago. It seemed to +her, thinking over the recent scene, that matters were even worse +than she had feared. This absurd revue, which she had looked on as a +mere isolated outbreak of foolishness, was, it would appear, only a +specimen of the sort of thing her misguided brother proposed to do, a +sample selected at random from a wholesale lot of frantic schemes. +Fillmore, there was no longer any room for doubt, was preparing to +express his great soul on a vast scale. And she could not dissuade +him. A humiliating thought. She had grown so accustomed through the +years to being the dominating mind that this revolt from her +authority made her feel helpless and inadequate. Her self-confidence +was shaken.</p> + +<p class="normal">And +Bruce Carmyle was financing him... It was illogical, but Sally could +not help feeling that when—she had not the optimism to say +“if”—he lost his money, she would somehow be under +an obligation to him, as if the disaster had been her fault. She +disliked, with a whole-hearted intensity, the thought of being under +an obligation to Mr. Carmyle.</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +said he had looked in to inspect the furniture on the chance that +Sally might want it shifted again: but Sally had no criticisms to +make on that subject. Weightier matters occupied her mind. She sat +Ginger down in the armchair and started to pour out her troubles. It +soothed her to talk to him. In a world which had somehow become +chaotic again after an all too brief period of peace, he was solid +and consoling.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +shouldn’t worry,” observed Ginger with Winch-like calm, +when she had finished drawing for him the picture of a Fillmore +rampant against a background of expensive revues. Sally nearly shook +him.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +all very well to tell me not to worry,” she cried. “How +can I help worrying? Fillmore’s simply a baby, and he’s +just playing the fool. He has lost his head completely. And I can’t +stop him! That is the awful part of it. I used to be able to look +him in the eye, and he would wag his tail and crawl back into his +basket, but now I seem to have no influence at all over him. He just +snorts and goes on running round in circles, breathing fire.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +did not abandon his attempts to indicate the silver lining.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +think you are making too much of all this, you know. I mean to say, +it’s quite likely he’s found some mug... what I mean is, +it’s just possible that your brother isn’t standing the +entire racket himself. Perhaps some rich Johnnie has breezed along +with a pot of money. It often happens like that, you know. You read +in the paper that some manager or other is putting on some show or +other, when really the chap who’s actually supplying the pieces +of eight is some anonymous lad in the background.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“That +is just what has happened, and it makes it worse than ever. Fillmore +tells me that your cousin, Mr. Carmyle, is providing the money.”</p> + +<p class="normal">This +did interest Ginger. He sat up with a jerk.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +I say!” he exclaimed.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes,” +said Sally, still agitated but pleased that she had at last shaken +him out of his trying attitude of detachment.</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +was scowling.</p> + +<p class="normal">“That’s +a bit off,” he observed.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +think so, too.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t like that.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Nor +do I.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do +you know what I think?” said Ginger, ever a man of plain speech +and a reckless plunger into delicate subjects. “The blighter’s +in love with you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +flushed. After examining the evidence before her, she had reached +the same conclusion in the privacy of her thoughts, but it +embarrassed her to hear the thing put into bald words.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +know Bruce,” continued Ginger, “and, believe me, he isn’t +the sort of cove to take any kind of flutter without a jolly good +motive. Of course, he’s got tons of money. His old guvnor was +the Carmyle of Carmyle, Brent & Co.—coal mines up in +Wales, and all that sort of thing—and I suppose he must have +left Bruce something like half a million. No need for the fellow to +have worked at all, if he hadn’t wanted to. As far as having +the stuff goes, he’s in a position to back all the shows he +wants to. But the point is, it’s right out of his line. He +doesn’t do that sort of thing. Not a drop of sporting blood in +the chap. Why I’ve known him stick the whole family on to me +just because it got noised about that I’d dropped a couple of +quid on the Grand National. If he’s really brought himself to +the point of shelling out on a risky proposition like a show, it +means something, take my word for it. And I don’t see what +else it can mean except... well, I mean to say, <i>is</i> it likely +that he’s doing it simply to make your brother look on him as a +good egg and a pal, and all that sort of thing?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +it’s not,” agreed Sally. “But don’t let’s +talk about it any more. Tell me all about your trip to Chicago.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“All +right. But, returning to this binge for a moment, I don’t see +how it matters to you one way or the other. You’re engaged to +another fellow, and when Bruce rolls up and says: ‘What about +it?’ you’ve simply to tell him that the shot isn’t +on the board and will he kindly melt away. Then you hand him his hat +and out he goes.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +gave a troubled laugh.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +think that’s simple, do you? I suppose you imagine that a girl +enjoys that sort of thing? Oh, what’s the use of talking about +it? It’s horrible, and no amount of arguing will make it +anything else. Do let’s change the subject. How did you like +Chicago?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +all right. Rather a grubby sort of place.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“So +I’ve always heard. But you ought not to mind that, being a +Londoner.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +I didn’t mind it. As a matter of fact, I had rather a good +time. Saw one or two shows, you know. Got in on my face as your +brother’s representative, which was all to the good. By the +way, it’s rummy how you run into people when you move about, +isn’t it?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +talk as if you had been dashing about the streets with your eyes +shut. Did you meet somebody you knew?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Chap +I hadn’t seen for years. Was at school with him, as a matter +of fact. Fellow named Foster. But I expect you know him, too, don’t +you? By name, at any rate. He wrote your brother’s show.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally’s +heart jumped.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh! +Did you meet Gerald—Foster?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ran +into him one night at the theatre.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +you were really at school with him?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes. + He was in the footer team with me my last year.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Was +he a scrum-half, too?” asked Sally, dimpling.</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +looked shocked.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +don’t have two scrum-halves in a team,” he said, pained +at this ignorance on a vital matter. “The scrum-half is the +half who works the scrum and...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +you told me that at Roville. What was Gerald—Mr. Foster then? +A six and seven-eighths, or something?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“He +was a wing-three,” said Ginger with a gravity befitting his +theme. “Rather fast, with a fairly decent swerve. But he +would <i>not</i> learn to give the reverse pass inside to the +centre.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ghastly!” +said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">“If,” +said Ginger earnestly, “a wing’s bottled up by his wing +and the back, the only thing he <i>can</i> do, if he doesn’t +want to be bundled into touch, is to give the reverse pass.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +know,” said Sally. “If I’ve thought that once, +I’ve thought it a hundred times. How nice it must have been +for you meeting again. I suppose you had all sorts of things to talk +about?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +shook his head.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Not +such a frightful lot. We were never very thick. You see, this chap +Foster was by way of being a bit of a worm.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“A +tick,” explained Ginger. “A rotter. He was pretty +generally barred at school. Personally, I never had any use for him +at all.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +stiffened. She had liked Ginger up to that moment, and later on, no +doubt, she would resume her liking for him: but in the immediate +moment which followed these words she found herself regarding him +with stormy hostility. How dare he sit there saying things like that +about Gerald?</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger, +who was lighting a cigarette without a care in the world, proceeded +to develop his theme.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +a rummy thing about school. Generally, if a fellow’s good at +games—in the cricket team or the footer team and so forth—he +can hardly help being fairly popular. But this blighter Foster +somehow—nobody seemed very keen on him. Of course, he had a +few of his own pals, but most of the chaps rather gave him a miss. +It may have been because he was a bit sidey... had rather an edge on +him, you know... Personally, the reason I barred him was because he +wasn’t straight. You didn’t notice it if you weren’t +thrown a goodish bit with him, of course, but he and I were in the +same house, and...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +managed to control her voice, though it shook a little.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +ought to tell you,” she said, and her tone would have warned +him had he been less occupied, “that Mr. Foster is a great +friend of mine.”</p> + +<p class="normal">But +Ginger was intent on the lighting of his cigarette, a delicate +operation with the breeze blowing in through the open window. His +head was bent, and he had formed his hands into a protective +framework which half hid his face.</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +you take my tip,” he mumbled, “you’ll drop him. +He’s a wrong ‘un.”</p> + +<p class="normal">He +spoke with the absent-minded drawl of preoccupation, and Sally could +keep the conflagration under no longer. She was aflame from head to +foot.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +may interest you to know,” she said, shooting the words out +like bullets from between clenched teeth, “that Gerald Foster +is the man I am engaged to marry.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger’s +head came slowly up from his cupped hands. Amazement was in his +eyes, and a sort of horror. The cigarette hung limply from his +mouth. He did not speak, but sat looking at her, dazed. Then the +match burnt his fingers, and he dropped it with a start. The sharp +sting of it seemed to wake him. He blinked.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’re +joking,” he said, feebly. There was a note of wistfulness in +his voice. “It isn’t true?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +kicked the leg of her chair irritably. She read insolent disapproval +into the words. He was daring to criticize... +</p> + +<p class="normal">“Of +course it’s true...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But...” +A look of hopeless misery came into Ginger’s pleasant face. He +hesitated. Then, with the air of a man bracing himself to a +dreadful, but unavoidable, ordeal, he went on. He spoke gruffly, and +his eyes, which had been fixed on Sally’s, wandered down to the +match on the carpet. It was still glowing, and mechanically he put a +foot on it.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Foster’s +married,” he said shortly. “He was married the day +before I left Chicago.”</p> + +<h3 class="sect">3</h3> + +<p class="normal">It +seemed to Ginger that in the silence which followed, brooding over +the room like a living presence, even the noises in the street had +ceased, as though what he had said had been a spell cutting Sally and +himself off from the outer world. Only the little clock on the +mantelpiece ticked—ticked—ticked, like a heart beating +fast.</p> + +<p class="normal">He +stared straight before him, conscious of a strange rigidity. He felt +incapable of movement, as he had sometimes felt in nightmares; and +not for all the wealth of America could he have raised his eyes just +then to Sally’s face. He could see her hands. They had +tightened on the arm of the chair. The knuckles were white.</p> + +<p class="normal">He +was blaming himself bitterly now for his oafish clumsiness in +blurting out the news so abruptly. And yet, curiously, in his +remorse there was something of elation. Never before had he felt so +near to her. It was as though a barrier that had been between them +had fallen.</p> + +<p class="normal">Something +moved... It was Sally’s hand, slowly relaxing. The fingers +loosened their grip, tightened again, then, as if reluctantly relaxed +once more. The blood flowed back.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Your +cigarette’s out.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +started violently. Her voice, coming suddenly out of the silence, +had struck him like a blow.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +thanks!”</p> + +<p class="normal">He +forced himself to light another match. It sputtered noisily in the +stillness. He blew it out, and the uncanny quiet fell again.</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +drew at his cigarette mechanically. For an instant he had seen +Sally’s face, white-cheeked and bright-eyed, the chin tilted +like a flag flying over a stricken field. His mood changed. All his +emotions had crystallized into a dull, futile rage, a helpless fury +directed at a man a thousand miles away.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +spoke again. Her voice sounded small and far off, an odd flatness in +it.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Married?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +threw his cigarette out of the window. He was shocked to find that +he was smoking. Nothing could have been farther from his intention +than to smoke. He nodded.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Whom +has he married?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +coughed. Something was sticking in his throat, and speech was +difficult.</p> + +<p class="normal">“A +girl called Doland.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +Elsa Doland?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Elsa +Doland.” Sally drummed with her fingers on the arm of the +chair. “Oh, Elsa Doland?”</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was silence again. The little clock ticked fussily on the +mantelpiece. Out in the street automobile horns were blowing. From +somewhere in the distance came faintly the rumble of an elevated +train. Familiar sounds, but they came to Sally now with a curious, +unreal sense of novelty. She felt as though she had been projected +into another world where everything was new and strange and +horrible—everything except Ginger. About him, in the mere +sight of him, there was something known and heartening.</p> + +<p class="normal">Suddenly, +she became aware that she was feeling that Ginger was behaving +extremely well. She seemed to have been taken out of herself and to +be regarding the scene from outside, regarding it coolly and +critically; and it was plain to her that Ginger, in this upheaval of +all things, was bearing himself perfectly. He had attempted no banal +words of sympathy. He had said nothing and he was not looking at +her. And Sally felt that sympathy just now would be torture, and +that she could not have borne to be looked at.</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +was wonderful. In that curious, detached spirit that had come upon +her, she examined him impartially, and gratitude welled up from the +very depths of her. There he sat, saying nothing and doing nothing, +as if he knew that all she needed, the only thing that could keep her +sane in this world of nightmare, was the sight of that dear, flaming +head of his that made her feel that the world had not slipped away +from her altogether.</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +did not move. The room had grown almost dark now. A spear of light +from a street lamp shone in through the window.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +got up abruptly. Slowly, gradually, inch by inch, the great +suffocating cloud which had been crushing her had lifted. She felt +alive again. Her black hour had gone, and she was back in the world +of living things once more. She was afire with a fierce, tearing +pain that tormented her almost beyond endurance, but dimly she sensed +the fact that she had passed through something that was worse than +pain, and, with Ginger’s stolid presence to aid her, had passed +triumphantly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Go +and have dinner, Ginger,” she said. “You must be +starving.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +came to life like a courtier in the palace of the Sleeping Beauty. +He shook himself, and rose stiffly from his chair.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +no,” he said. “Not a bit, really.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +switched on the light and set him blinking. She could bear to be +looked at now.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Go +and dine,” she said. “Dine lavishly and luxuriously. +You’ve certainly earned...” Her voice faltered for a +moment. She held out her hand. “Ginger,” she said +shakily, “I... Ginger, you’re a pal.”</p> + +<p class="normal">When +he had gone. Sally sat down and began to cry. Then she dried her +eyes in a business-like manner.</p> + +<p class="normal">“There, +Miss Nicholas!” she said. “You couldn’t have done +that an hour ago... We will now boil you an egg for your dinner and +see how that suits you!”</p> + + + +<h3 class="chap">CHAPTER XI</h3> + +<h3 class="titl">SALLY RUNS AWAY</h3> + +<p class="normal">If +Ginger Kemp had been asked to enumerate his good qualities, it is not +probable that he would have drawn up a very lengthy list. He might +have started by claiming for himself the virtue of meaning well, but +after that he would have had to chew the pencil in prolonged +meditation. And, even if he could eventually have added one or two +further items to the catalogue, tact and delicacy of feeling would +not have been among them.</p> + +<p class="normal">Yet, +by staying away from Sally during the next few days he showed +considerable delicacy. It was not easy to stay away from her, but he +forced himself to do so. He argued from his own tastes, and was +strongly of opinion that in times of travail, solitude was what the +sufferer most desired. In his time he, too, had had what he would +have described as nasty jars, and on these occasions all he had asked +was to be allowed to sit and think things over and fight his battle +out by himself.</p> + +<p class="normal">By +Saturday, however, he had come to the conclusion that some form of +action might now be taken. Saturday was rather a good day for +picking up the threads again. He had not to go to the office, and, +what was still more to the point, he had just drawn his week’s +salary. Mrs. Meecher had deftly taken a certain amount of this off +him, but enough remained to enable him to attempt consolation on a +fairly princely scale. There presented itself to him as a judicious +move the idea of hiring a car and taking Sally out to dinner at one +of the road-houses he had heard about up the Boston Post Road. He +examined the scheme. The more he looked at it, the better it seemed.</p> + +<p class="normal">He +was helped to this decision by the extraordinary perfection of the +weather. The weather of late had been a revelation to Ginger. It +was his first experience of America’s Indian Summer, and it had +quite overcome him. As he stood on the roof of Mrs. Meecher’s +establishment on the Saturday morning, thrilled by the velvet wonder +of the sunshine, it seemed to him that the only possible way of +passing such a day was to take Sally for a ride in an open car.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +Maison Meecher was a lofty building on one of the side-streets at the +lower end of the avenue. From its roof, after you had worked your +way through the groves of washing which hung limply from the +clothes-line, you could see many things of interest. To the left lay +Washington Square, full of somnolent Italians and roller-skating +children; to the right was a spectacle which never failed to intrigue +Ginger, the high smoke-stacks of a Cunard liner moving slowly down +the river, sticking up over the house-tops as if the boat was +travelling down Ninth Avenue.</p> + +<p class="normal">To-day +there were four of these funnels, causing Ginger to deduce the +<i>Mauritania. </i>As the boat on which he had come over from +England, the <i>Mauritania</i> had a sentimental interest for him. +He stood watching her stately progress till the higher buildings +farther down the town shut her from his sight; then picked his way +through the washing and went down to his room to get his hat. A +quarter of an hour later he was in the hall-way of Sally’s +apartment house, gazing with ill-concealed disgust at the serge-clad +back of his cousin Mr. Carmyle, who was engaged in conversation with +a gentleman in overalls.</p> + +<p class="normal">No +care-free prospector, singing his way through the Mojave Desert and +suddenly finding himself confronted by a rattlesnake, could have +experienced so abrupt a change of mood as did Ginger at this +revolting spectacle. Even in their native Piccadilly it had been +unpleasant to run into Mr. Carmyle. To find him here now was nothing +short of nauseating. Only one thing could have brought him to this +place. Obviously, he must have come to see Sally; and with a sudden +sinking of the heart Ginger remembered the shiny, expensive +automobile which he had seen waiting at the door. He, it was clear, +was not the only person to whom the idea had occurred of taking Sally +for a drive on this golden day.</p> + +<p class="normal">He +was still standing there when Mr. Carmyle swung round with a frown on +his dark face which seemed to say that he had not found the janitor’s +conversation entertaining. The sight of Ginger plainly did nothing +to lighten his gloom.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Hullo!” +he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Hullo!” +said Ginger.</p> + +<p class="normal">Uncomfortable +silence followed these civilities.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Have +you come to see Miss Nicholas?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why, +yes.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“She +isn’t here,” said Mr. Carmyle, and the fact that he had +found someone to share the bad news, seemed to cheer him a little.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Not +here?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No. + Apparently...” Bruce Carmyle’s scowl betrayed that +resentment which a well-balanced man cannot but feel at the +unreasonableness of others. “... Apparently, for some +extraordinary reason, she has taken it into her head to dash over to +England.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +tottered. The unexpectedness of the blow was crushing. He followed +his cousin out into the sunshine in a sort of dream. Bruce Carmyle +was addressing the driver of the expensive automobile.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +find I shall not want the car. You can take it back to the garage.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +chauffeur, a moody man, opened one half-closed eye and spat +cautiously. It was the way Rockefeller would have spat when +approaching the crisis of some delicate financial negotiation.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’ll +have to pay just the same,” he observed, opening his other eye +to lend emphasis to the words.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Of +course I shall pay,” snapped Mr. Carmyle, irritably. “How +much is it?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Money +passed. The car rolled off.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Gone +to England?” said Ginger, dizzily.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +gone to England.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +why?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“How +the devil do I know why?” Bruce Carmyle would have found his +best friend trying at this moment. Gaping Ginger gave him almost a +physical pain. “All I know is what the janitor told me, that +she sailed on the <i>Mauretania</i> this morning.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +tragic irony of this overcame Ginger. That he should have stood on +the roof, calmly watching the boat down the river... +</p> + +<p class="normal">He +nodded absently to Mr. Carmyle and walked off. He had no further +remarks to make. The warmth had gone out of the sunshine and all +interest had departed from his life. He felt dull, listless, at a +loose end. Not even the thought that his cousin, a careful man with +his money, had had to pay a day’s hire for a car which he could +not use brought him any balm. He loafed aimlessly about the streets. + He wandered in the Park and out again. The Park bored him. The +streets bored him. The whole city bored him. A city without Sally +in it was a drab, futile city, and nothing that the sun could do to +brighten it could make it otherwise.</p> + +<p class="normal">Night +came at last, and with it a letter. It was the first even passably +pleasant thing that had happened to Ginger in the whole of this +dreary and unprofitable day: for the envelope bore the crest of the +good ship <i>Mauretania. </i>He snatched it covetously from the +letter-rack, and carried it upstairs to his room.</p> + +<p class="normal">Very +few of the rooms at Mrs. Meecher’s boarding-house struck any +note of luxury. Mrs. Meecher was not one of your fashionable +interior decorators. She considered that when she had added a Morris +chair to the essentials which make up a bedroom, she had gone as far +in the direction of pomp as any guest at seven-and-a-half per could +expect her to go. As a rule, the severity of his surroundings +afflicted Ginger with a touch of gloom when he went to bed; but +to-night—such is the magic of a letter from the right person—he +was uplifted and almost gay. There are moments when even illuminated +texts over the wash-stand cannot wholly quell us.</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was nothing of haste and much of ceremony in Ginger’s method of +approaching the perusal of his correspondence. He bore himself after +the manner of a small boy in the presence of unexpected ice-cream, +gloating for awhile before embarking on the treat, anxious to make it +last out. His first move was to feel in the breast-pocket of his +coat and produce the photograph of Sally which he had feloniously +removed from her apartment. At this he looked long and earnestly +before propping it up within easy reach against his basin, to be +handy, if required, for purposes of reference. He then took off his +coat, collar, and shoes, filled and lit a pipe, placed pouch and +matches on the arm of the Morris chair, and drew that chair up so +that he could sit with his feet on the bed. Having manoeuvred +himself into a position of ease, he lit his pipe again and took up +the letter. He looked at the crest, the handwriting of the address, +and the postmark. He weighed it in his hand. It was a bulky letter.</p> + +<p class="normal">He +took Sally’s photograph from the wash-stand and scrutinized it +once more. Then he lit his pipe again, and, finally, wriggling +himself into the depths of the chair, opened the envelope.</p> + +<p class="normal">“<i>Ginger, +dear.”</i></p> + +<p class="normal">Having +read so far, Ginger found it necessary to take up the photograph and +study it with an even greater intentness than before. He gazed at it +for many minutes, then laid it down and lit his pipe again. Then he +went on with the letter.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ginger, +dear—I’m afraid this address is going to give you rather +a shock, and I’m feeling very guilty. I’m running away, +and I haven’t even stopped to say good-bye. I can’t help +it. I know it’s weak and cowardly, but I simply can’t +help it. I stood it for a day or two, and then I saw that it was no +good. (Thank you for leaving me alone and not coming round to see +me. Nobody else but you would have done that. But then, nobody ever +has been or ever could be so understanding as you.)”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +found himself compelled at this point to look at the photograph +again.</p> + +<p class="normal">“There +was too much in New York to remind me. That’s the worst of +being happy in a place. When things go wrong you find there are too +many ghosts about. I just couldn’t stand it. I tried, but I +couldn’t. I’m going away to get cured—if I can. +Mr. Faucitt is over in England, and when I went down to Mrs. Meecher +for my letters, I found one from him. His brother is dead, you know, +and he has inherited, of all things, a fashionable dress-making place +in Regent Street. His brother was Laurette et Cie. I suppose he +will sell the business later on, but, just at present, the poor old +dear is apparently quite bewildered and that doesn’t seem to +have occurred to him. He kept saying in his letter how much he +wished I was with him, to help him, and I was tempted and ran. +Anything to get away from the ghosts and have something to do. I +don’t suppose I shall feel much better in England, but, at +least, every street corner won’t have associations. Don’t +ever be happy anywhere, Ginger. It’s too big a risk, much too +big a risk.</p> + +<p class="normal">“There +was a letter from Elsa Doland, too. Bubbling over with affection. +We had always been tremendous friends. Of course, she never knew +anything about my being engaged to Gerald. I lent Fillmore the money +to buy that piece, which gave Elsa her first big chance, and so she’s +very grateful. She says, if ever she gets the opportunity of doing +me a good turn... Aren’t things muddled?</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +there was a letter from Gerald. I was expecting one, of course, +but... what would you have done, Ginger? Would you have read it? I +sat with it in front of me for an hour, I should think, just looking +at the envelope, and then... You see, what was the use? I could guess +exactly the sort of thing that would be in it, and reading it would +only have hurt a lot more. The thing was done, so why bother about +explanations? What good are explanations, anyway? They don’t +help. They don’t do anything... I burned it, Ginger. The last +letter I shall ever get from him. I made a bonfire on the bathroom +floor, and it smouldered and went brown, and then flared a little, +and every now and then I lit another match and kept it burning, and +at last it was just black ashes and a stain on the tiles. Just a +mess!</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ginger, +burn this letter, too. I’m pouring out all the poison to you, +hoping it will make me feel better. You don’t mind, do you? +But I know you don’t. If ever anybody had a real pal... +</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +a dreadful thing, fascination, Ginger. It grips you and you are +helpless. One can be so sensible and reasonable about other people’s +love affairs. When I was working at the dance place I told you about +there was a girl who fell in love with the most awful little beast. +He had a mean mouth and shiny black hair brushed straight back, and +anybody would have seen what he was. But this girl wouldn’t +listen to a word. I talked to her by the hour. It makes me smile +now when I think how sensible and level-headed I was. But she +wouldn’t listen. In some mysterious way this was the man she +wanted, and, of course, everything happened that one knew would +happen.</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +one could manage one’s own life as well as one can manage other +people’s! If all this wretched thing of mine had happened to +some other girl, how beautifully I could have proved that it was the +best thing that could have happened, and that a man who could behave +as Gerald has done wasn’t worth worrying about. I can just +hear myself. But, you see, whatever he has done, Gerald is still +Gerald and Sally is still Sally and, however much I argue, I can’t +get away from that. All I can do is to come howling to my redheaded +pal, when I know just as well as he does that a girl of any spirit +would be dignified and keep her troubles to herself and be much too +proud to let anyone know that she was hurt.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Proud! +That’s the real trouble, Ginger. My pride has been battered +and chopped up and broken into as many pieces as you broke Mr. +Scrymgeour’s stick! What pitiful creatures we are. Girls, I +mean. At least, I suppose a good many girls are like me. If Gerald +had died and I had lost him that way, I know quite well I shouldn’t +be feeling as I do now. I should have been broken-hearted, but it +wouldn’t have been the same. It’s my pride that is hurt. + I have always been a bossy, cocksure little creature, swaggering +about the world like an English sparrow; and now I’m paying for +it! Oh, Ginger, I’m paying for it! I wonder if running away is +going to do me any good at all. Perhaps, if Mr. Faucitt has some +real hard work for me to do... +</p> + +<p class="normal">“Of +course, I know exactly how all this has come about. Elsa’s +pretty and attractive. But the point is that she is a success, and +as a success she appeals to Gerald’s weakest side. He worships +success. She is going to have a marvellous career, and she can help +Gerald on in his. He can write plays for her to star in. What have +I to offer against that? Yes, I know it’s grovelling and +contemptible of me to say that, Ginger. I ought to be above it, +oughtn’t I—talking as if I were competing for some +prize... But I haven’t any pride left. Oh, well!</p> + +<p class="normal">“There! +I’ve poured it all out and I really do feel a little better +just for the moment. It won’t last, of course, but even a +minute is something. Ginger, dear, I shan’t see you for ever +so long, even if we ever do meet again, but you’ll try to +remember that I’m thinking of you a whole lot, won’t you? +I feel responsible for you. You’re my baby. You’ve got +started now and you’ve only to stick to it. Please, please, +<i>please</i> don’t ‘make a hash of it’! Good-bye. +I never did find that photograph of me that we were looking for that +afternoon in the apartment, or I would send it to you. Then you +could have kept it on your mantelpiece, and whenever you felt +inclined to make a hash of anything I would have caught your eye +sternly and you would have pulled up.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Good-bye, +Ginger. I shall have to stop now. The mail is just closing.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Always +your pal, wherever I am.-—sally.” +</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +laid the letter down, and a little sound escaped him that was half a +sigh, half an oath. He was wondering whether even now some desirable +end might not be achieved by going to Chicago and breaking Gerald +Foster’s neck. Abandoning this scheme as impracticable, and +not being able to think of anything else to do he re-lit his pipe and +started to read the letter again.</p> + + +<h3 class="chap">CHAPTER XII</h3> + +<h3 class="titl">SOME LETTERS FOR GINGER</h3> + +<p class="right"> +Laurette et Cie,<br> +Regent Street,<br> +London, W.,<br> +England.<br> +<br> +</p> + +<p class="normal"><i>January +21st.</i></p> + +<p class="normal">Dear +Ginger,—I’m feeling better. As it’s three months +since I last wrote to you, no doubt you will say to yourself that I +would be a poor, weak-minded creature if I wasn’t. I suppose +one ought to be able to get over anything in three months. +Unfortunately, I’m afraid I haven’t quite succeeded in +doing that, but at least I have managed to get my troubles stowed +away in the cellar, and I’m not dragging them out and looking +at them all the time. That’s something, isn’t it?</p> + +<p class="normal">I +ought to give you all my impressions of London, I suppose; but I’ve +grown so used to the place that I don’t think I have any now. +I seem to have been here years and years.</p> + +<p class="normal">You +will see by the address that Mr. Faucitt has not yet sold his +inheritance. He expects to do so very soon, he tells me—there +is a rich-looking man with whiskers and a keen eye whom he is always +lunching with, and I think big deals are in progress. Poor dear! he +is crazy to get away into the country and settle down and grow ducks +and things. London has disappointed him. It is not the place it +used to be. Until quite lately, when he grew resigned, he used to +wander about in a disconsolate sort of way, trying to locate the +landmarks of his youth. (He has not been in England for nearly +thirty years!) The trouble is, it seems, that about once in every +thirty years a sort of craze for change comes over London, and they +paint a shop-front red instead of blue, and that upsets the returned +exile dreadfully. Mr. Faucitt feels like Rip Van Winkle. His first +shock was when he found that the Empire was a theatre now instead of +a music-hall. Then he was told that another music-hall, the Tivoli, +had been pulled down altogether. And when on top of that he went to +look at the baker’s shop in Rupert Street, over which he had +lodgings in the eighties, and discovered that it had been turned into +a dressmaker’s, he grew very melancholy, and only cheered up a +little when a lovely magenta fog came on and showed him that some +things were still going along as in the good old days.</p> + +<p class="normal">I +am kept quite busy at Laurette et Cie., thank goodness. (Not being a +French scholar like you—do you remember Jules?—I thought +at first that Cie was the name of the junior partner, and looked +forward to meeting him. “Miss Nicholas, shake hands with Mr. +Cie, one of your greatest admirers.”) I hold down the female +equivalent of your job at the Fillmore Nicholas Theatrical +Enterprises Ltd.—that is to say, I’m a sort of right-hand +woman. I hang around and sidle up to the customers when they come +in, and say, “Chawming weather, moddom!” (which is +usually a black lie) and pass them on to the staff, who do the actual +work. I shouldn’t mind going on like this for the next few +years, but Mr. Faucitt is determined to sell. I don’t know if +you are like that, but every other Englishman I’ve ever met +seems to have an ambition to own a house and lot in Loamshire or +Hants or Salop or somewhere. Their one object in life is to make +some money and “buy back the old place”—which was +sold, of course, at the end of act one to pay the heir’s +gambling debts.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Faucitt, when he was a small boy, used to live in a little village in +Gloucestershire, near a place called Cirencester—at least, it +isn’t: it’s called Cissister, which I bet you didn’t +know—and after forgetting about it for fifty years, he has +suddenly been bitten by the desire to end his days there, surrounded +by pigs and chickens. He took me down to see the place the other +day. Oh, Ginger, this English country! Why any of you ever live in +towns I can’t think. Old, old grey stone houses with yellow +haystacks and lovely squelchy muddy lanes and great fat trees and +blue hills in the distance. The peace of it! If ever I sell my soul, +I shall insist on the devil giving me at least forty years in some +English country place in exchange.</p> + +<p class="normal">Perhaps +you will think from all this that I am too much occupied to remember +your existence. Just to show how interested I am in you, let me tell +you that, when I was reading the paper a week ago, I happened to see +the headline, “International Match.” It didn’t seem +to mean anything at first, and then I suddenly recollected. This was +the thing you had once been a snip for! So I went down to a place +called Twickenham, where this football game was to be, to see the +sort of thing you used to do before I took charge of you and made you +a respectable right-hand man. There was an enormous crowd there, and +I was nearly squeezed to death, but I bore it for your sake. I found +out that the English team were the ones wearing white shirts, and +that the ones in red were the Welsh. I said to the man next to me, +after he had finished yelling himself black in the face, “Could +you kindly inform me which is the English scrum-half?” And just +at that moment the players came quite near where I was, and about a +dozen assassins in red hurled themselves violently on top of a +meek-looking little fellow who had just fallen on the ball. Ginger, +you are well out of it! <i>That</i> was the scrum-half, and I +gathered that that sort of thing was a mere commonplace in his +existence. Stopping a rush, it is called, and he is expected to do +it all the time. The idea of you ever going in for such brutal +sports! You thank your stars that you are safe on your little stool +in Fillmore’s outer office, and that, if anybody jumps on top +of you now, you can call a cop. Do you mean to say you really used +to do these daredevil feats? You must have hidden depths in you which +I have never suspected.</p> + +<p class="normal">As +I was taking a ride down Piccadilly the other day on top of a bus, I +saw somebody walking along who seemed familiar. It was Mr. Carmyle. +So he’s back in England again. He didn’t see me, thank +goodness. I don’t want to meet anybody just at present who +reminds me of New York.</p> + +<p class="normal">Thanks +for telling me all the news, but please don’t do it again. It +makes me remember, and I don’t want to. It’s this way, +Ginger. Let me write to you, because it really does relieve me, but +don’t answer my letters. Do you mind? I’m sure you’ll +understand.</p> + +<p class="normal">So +Fillmore and Gladys Winch are married! From what I have seen of her, +it’s the best thing that has ever happened to Brother F. She +is a splendid girl. I must write to him... +</p> + +<p style="text-indent: 1.27cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br> +</p> + +<p class="right"> +Laurette et Cie.<br> +London</p> + +<p style="text-indent: 1.27cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br> +</p> + +<p class="normal"><i>March 12th.</i> .</p> + +<p class="normal">Dear +Ginger,—I saw in a Sunday paper last week that “The +Primrose Way” had been produced in New York, and was a great +success. Well, I’m very glad. But I don’t think the +papers ought to print things like that. It’s unsettling.</p> + +<p class="normal">Next +day, I did one of those funny things you do when you’re feeling +blue and lonely and a long way away from everybody. I called at your +club and asked for you! Such a nice old man in uniform at the desk +said in a fatherly way that you hadn’t been in lately, and he +rather fancied you were out of town, but would I take a seat while he +inquired. He then summoned a tiny boy, also in uniform, and the +child skipped off chanting, “Mister Kemp! Mister Kemp!” +in a shrill treble. It gave me such an odd feeling to hear your name +echoing in the distance. I felt so ashamed for giving them all that +trouble; and when the boy came back I slipped twopence into his palm, +which I suppose was against all the rules, though he seemed to like +it.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Faucitt has sold the business and retired to the country, and I am +rather at a loose end…</p> + +<p class="normal"><br> +</p> + +<p class="right">Monk’s Crofton,<br> +<i>(whatever that means)</i><br> +Much Middleford,<br> +Salop,<br> +<i>(slang for Shropshire)</i><br> +England.</p> + +<p class="normal"><i>April 18th.</i></p> + +<p class="normal">Dear +Ginger,—What’s the use? What <i>is</i> the use? I do all +I can to get right away from New York, and New York comes after me +and tracks me down in my hiding-place. A week or so ago, as I was +walking down the Strand in an aimless sort of way, out there came +right on top of me—who do you think? Fillmore, arm in arm with +Mr. Carmyle! I couldn’t dodge. In the first place, Mr. Carmyle +had seen me; in the second place, it is a day’s journey to +dodge poor dear Fillmore now. I blushed for him. Ginger! Right +there in the Strand I blushed for him. In my worst dreams I had +never pictured him so enormous. Upon what meat doth this our +Fillmore feed that he is grown so great? Poor Gladys! When she looks +at him she must feel like a bigamist.</p> + +<p class="normal">Apparently +Fillmore is still full of big schemes, for he talked airily about +buying all sorts of English plays. He has come over, as I suppose +you know, to arrange about putting on “The Primrose Way” +over here. He is staying at the Savoy, and they took me off there to +lunch, whooping joyfully as over a strayed lamb. It was the worst +thing that could possibly have happened to me. Fillmore talked +Broadway without a pause, till by the time he had worked his way past +the French pastry and was lolling back, breathing a little +stertorously, waiting for the coffee and liqueurs, he had got me so +homesick that, if it hadn’t been that I didn’t want to +make a public exhibition of myself, I should have broken down and +howled. It was crazy of me ever to go near the Savoy. Of course, +it’s simply an annex to Broadway. There were Americans at +every table as far as the eye could reach. I might just as well have +been at the Astor.</p> + +<p class="normal">Well, +if Fate insists in bringing New York to England for my special +discomfiture, I suppose I have got to put up with it. I just let +events take their course, and I have been drifting ever since. Two +days ago I drifted here. Mr. Carmyle invited Fillmore—he seems +to love Fillmore—and me to Monk’s Crofton, and I hadn’t +even the shadow of an excuse for refusing. So I came, and I am now +sitting writing to you in an enormous bedroom with an open fire and +armchairs and every other sort of luxury. Fillmore is out golfing. +He sails for New York on Saturday on the <i>Mauretania. </i>I am +horrified to hear from him that, in addition to all his other big +schemes, he is now promoting a fight for the light-weight +championship in Jersey City, and guaranteeing enormous sums to both +boxers. It’s no good arguing with him. If you do, he simply +quotes figures to show the fortunes other people have made out of +these things. Besides, it’s too late now, anyway. As far as I +can make out, the fight is going to take place in another week or +two. All the same, it makes my flesh creep.</p> + +<p class="normal">Well, +it’s no use worrying, I suppose. Let’s change the +subject. Do you know Monk’s Crofton? Probably you don’t, +as I seem to remember hearing something said about it being a recent +purchase. Mr. Carmyle bought it from some lord or other who had been +losing money on the Stock Exchange. I hope you haven’t seen +it, anyway, because I want to describe it at great length. I want to +pour out my soul about it. Ginger, what has England ever done to +deserve such paradises? I thought, in my ignorance, that Mr. +Faucitt’s Cissister place was pretty good, but it doesn’t +even begin. It can’t compete. Of course, his is just an +ordinary country house, and this is a Seat. Monk’s Crofton is +the sort of place they used to write about in the English novels. +<i>You</i> know. “The sunset was falling on the walls of G—— +Castle, in B——shire, hard by the picturesque village of +H——, and not a stone’s throw from the hamlet of +J——.” I can imagine Tennyson’s Maud living +here. It is one of the stately homes of England; how beautiful they +stand, and I’m crazy about it.</p> + +<p class="normal">You +motor up from the station, and after you have gone about three miles, +you turn in at a big iron gate with stone posts on each side with +stone beasts on them. Close by the gate is the cutest little house +with an old man inside it who pops out and touches his hat. This is +only the lodge, really, but you think you have arrived; so you get +all ready to jump out, and then the car goes rolling on for another +fifty miles or so through beech woods full of rabbits and open +meadows with deer in them. Finally, just as you think you are going +on for ever, you whizz round a corner, and there’s the house. +You don’t get a glimpse of it till then, because the trees are +too thick.</p> + +<p class="normal">It’s +very large, and sort of low and square, with a kind of tower at one +side and the most fascinating upper porch sort of thing with +battlements. I suppose in the old days you used to stand on this and +drop molten lead on visitors’ heads. Wonderful lawns all +round, and shrubberies and a lake that you can just see where the +ground dips beyond the fields. Of course it’s too early yet +for them to be out, but to the left of the house there’s a +place where there will be about a million roses when June comes +round, and all along the side of the rose-garden is a high wall of +old red brick which shuts off the kitchen garden. I went exploring +there this morning. It’s an enormous place, with hot-houses +and things, and there’s the cunningest farm at one end with a +stable yard full of puppies that just tear the heart out of you, +they’re so sweet. And a big, sleepy cat, which sits and blinks +in the sun and lets the puppies run all over her. And there’s +a lovely stillness, and you can hear everything growing. And +thrushes and blackbirds... Oh, Ginger, it’s heavenly!</p> + +<p class="normal">But +there’s a catch. It’s a case of “Where every +prospect pleases and only man is vile.” At least, not exactly +vile, I suppose, but terribly stodgy. I can see now why you couldn’t +hit it off with the Family. Because I’ve seen ‘em all! +They’re here! Yes, Uncle Donald and all of them. Is it a habit +of your family to collect in gangs, or have I just happened to +stumble into an accidental Old Home Week? When I came down to dinner +the first evening, the drawing-room was full to bursting point—not +simply because Fillmore was there, but because there were uncles and +aunts all over the place. I felt like a small lion in a den of +Daniels. I know exactly now what you mean about the Family. They +<i>look</i> at you! Of course, it’s all right for me, because I +am snowy white clear through, but I can just imagine what it must +have been like for you with your permanently guilty conscience. You +must have had an awful time.</p> + +<p class="normal">By +the way, it’s going to be a delicate business getting this +letter through to you—rather like carrying the despatches +through the enemy’s lines in a Civil War play. You’re +supposed to leave letters on the table in the hall, and someone +collects them in the afternoon and takes them down to the village on +a bicycle. But, if I do that some aunt or uncle is bound to see it, +and I shall be an object of loathing, for it is no light matter, my +lad, to be caught having correspondence with a human Jimpson weed +like you. It would blast me socially. At least, so I gather from +the way they behaved when your name came up at dinner last night. +Somebody mentioned you, and the most awful roasting party broke +loose. Uncle Donald acting as cheer-leader. I said feebly that I +had met you and had found you part human, and there was an awful +silence till they all started at the same time to show me where I was +wrong, and how cruelly my girlish inexperience had deceived me. A +young and innocent half-portion like me, it appears, is absolutely +incapable of suspecting the true infamy of the dregs of society. You +aren’t fit to speak to the likes of me, being at the kindest +estimate little more than a blot on the human race. I tell you this +in case you may imagine you’re popular with the Family. You’re +not.</p> + +<p class="normal">So +I shall have to exercise a good deal of snaky craft in smuggling this +letter through. I’ll take it down to the village myself if I +can sneak away. But it’s going to be pretty difficult, because +for some reason I seem to be a centre of attraction. Except when I +take refuge in my room, hardly a moment passes without an aunt or an +uncle popping out and having a cosy talk with me. It sometimes seems +as though they were weighing me in the balance. Well, let ‘em +weigh!</p> + +<p class="normal">Time +to dress for dinner now. Good-bye.</p> + +<p class="right">Yours +in the balance,</p> + +<p class="right">sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">P.S.—You +were perfectly right about your Uncle Donald’s moustache, but I +don’t agree with you that it is more his misfortune than his +fault. I think he does it on purpose.</p> + +<p style="text-indent: 1.27cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br> +</p> + +<p class="right"><i>(Just for the moment)</i><br> +Monk’s Crofton,<br> +Much Middleford,<br> +Salop,<br> +England.</p> + +<p style="text-indent: 1.27cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br> +</p> + +<p class="normal"><i>April +20th.</i></p> + +<p class="normal">Dear +Ginger,—Leaving here to-day. In disgrace. Hard, cold looks +from the family. Strained silences. Uncle Donald far from chummy. +You can guess what has happened. I might have seen it coming. I can +see now that it was in the air all along.</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +knows nothing about it. He left just before it happened. I shall +see him very soon, for I have decided to come back and stop running +away from things any longer. It’s cowardly to skulk about over +here. Besides, I’m feeling so much better that I believe I can +face the ghosts. Anyway, I’m going to try. See you almost as +soon as you get this.</p> + +<p class="normal">I +shall mail this in London, and I suppose it will come over by the +same boat as me. It’s hardly worth writing, really, of course, +but I have sneaked up to my room to wait till the motor arrives to +take me to the station, and it’s something to do. I can hear +muffled voices. The Family talking me over, probably. Saying they +never really liked me all along. Oh, well!</p> + +<p class="right">Yours +moving in an orderly manner to the exit,</p> + +<p class="right">SALLY.</p> + + +<h3 class="chap">CHAPTER XIII</h3> + +<h3 class="titl">STRANGE BEHAVIOUR OF A SPARRING-PARTNER</h3> + +<h3 class="sect">1</h3> + +<p class="normal">Sally’s +emotions, as she sat in her apartment on the morning of her return to +New York, resembled somewhat those of a swimmer who, after wavering +on a raw morning at the brink of a chill pool, nerves himself to the +plunge. She was aching, but she knew that she had done well. If she +wanted happiness, she must fight for it, and for all these months she +had been shirking the fight. She had done with wavering on the +brink, and here she was, in mid-stream, ready for whatever might +befall. It hurt, this coming to grips. She had expected it to hurt. + But it was a pain that stimulated, not a dull melancholy that +smothered. She felt alive and defiant.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +had finished unpacking and tidying up. The next move was certainly +to go and see Ginger. She had suddenly become aware that she wanted +very badly to see Ginger. His stolid friendliness would be a support +and a prop. She wished now that she had sent him a cable, so that he +could have met her at the dock. It had been rather terrible at the +dock. The echoing customs sheds had sapped her valour and she felt +alone and forlorn.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +looked at her watch, and was surprised to find how early it was. She +could catch him at the office and make him take her out to lunch. +She put on her hat and went out.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +restless hand of change, always active in New York, had not spared +the outer office of the Fillmore Nicholas Theatrical Enterprises Ltd. +in the months of her absence. She was greeted on her arrival by an +entirely new and original stripling in the place of the one with whom +at her last visit she had established such cordial relations. Like +his predecessor he was generously pimpled, but there the resemblance +stopped. He was a grim boy, and his manner was stern and suspicious. + He peered narrowly at Sally for a moment as if he had caught her in +the act of purloining the office blotting-paper, then, with no little +acerbity, desired her to state her business.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +want Mr. Kemp,” said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +office-boy scratched his cheek dourly with a ruler. No one would +have guessed, so austere was his aspect, that a moment before her +entrance he had been trying to balance it on his chin, juggling the +while with a pair of paper-weights. For, impervious as he seemed to +human weaknesses, it was this lad’s ambition one day to go into +vaudeville.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +name?” he said, coldly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Nicholas,” +said Sally. “I am Mr. Nicholas’ sister.”</p> + +<p class="normal">On +a previous occasion when she had made this announcement, disastrous +results had ensued; but to-day it went well. It seemed to hit the +office-boy like a bullet. He started convulsively, opened his mouth, +and dropped the ruler. In the interval of stooping and recovering it +he was able to pull himself together. He had not been curious about +Sally’s name. What he had wished was to have the name of the +person for whom she was asking repeated. He now perceived that he +had had a bit of luck. A wearying period of disappointment in the +matter of keeping the paper-weights circulating while balancing the +ruler, had left him peevish, and it had been his intention to work +off his ill-humour on the young visitor. The discovery that it was +the boss’s sister who was taking up his time, suggested the +advisability of a radical change of tactics. He had stooped with a +frown: he returned to the perpendicular with a smile that was +positively winning. It was like the sun suddenly bursting through a +London fog.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Will +you take a seat, lady?” he said, with polished courtesy even +unbending so far as to reach out and dust one with the sleeve of his +coat. He added that the morning was a fine one.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Thank +you,” said Sally. “Will you tell him I’m here.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Mr. +Nicholas is out, miss,” said the office-boy, with gentlemanly +regret. “He’s back in New York, but he’s gone +out.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t want Mr. Nicholas. I want Mr. Kemp.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Mr. +Kemp?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +Mr. Kemp.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sorrow +at his inability to oblige shone from every hill-top on the boy’s +face.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Don’t +know of anyone of that name around here,” he said, +apologetically.</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +surely...” Sally broke off suddenly. A grim foreboding had +come to her. “How long have you been here?” she asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">“All +day, ma’am,” said the office-boy, with the manner of a +Casablanca.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +mean, how long have you been employed here?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Just +over a month, miss.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Hasn’t +Mr. Kemp been in the office all that time?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Name’s +new to <i>me,</i> lady. Does he look like anything? I meanter say, +what’s he look like?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“He +has very red hair.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Never +seen him in here,” said the office-boy. The truth shone coldly +on Sally. She blamed herself for ever having gone away, and told +herself that she might have known what would happen. Left to his own +resources, the unhappy Ginger had once more made a hash of it. And +this hash must have been a more notable and outstanding hash than any +of his previous efforts, for, surely, Fillmore would not lightly have +dismissed one who had come to him under her special protection.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Where +is Mr. Nicholas?” she asked. It seemed to her that Fillmore +was the only possible source of information. “Did you say he +was out?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Really +out, miss,” said the office-boy, with engaging candour. “He +went off to White Plains in his automobile half-an-hour ago.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“White +Plains? What for?”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +pimpled stripling had now given himself up wholeheartedly to social +chit-chat. Usually he liked his time to himself and resented the +intrusion of the outer world, for he who had chosen jugglery for his +walk in life must neglect no opportunity of practising: but so +favourable was the impression which Sally had made on his plastic +mind that he was delighted to converse with her as long as she +wished.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +guess what’s happened is, he’s gone up to take a look at +Bugs Butler,” he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">“<i>Whose</i> +butler?” said Sally mystified.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +office-boy smiled a tolerant smile. Though an admirer of the sex, he +was aware that women were seldom hep to the really important things +in life. He did not blame them. That was the way they were +constructed, and one simply had to accept it.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Bugs +Butler is training up at White Plains, miss.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Who +is Bugs Butler?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Something +of his former bleakness of aspect returned to the office-boy. +Sally’s question had opened up a subject on which he felt +deeply.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ah!” +he replied, losing his air of respectful deference as he approached +the topic. “Who <i>is</i> he! That’s what they’re +all saying, all the wise guys. Who has Bugs Butler ever licked?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t know,” said Sally, for he had fixed her with a +penetrating gaze and seemed to be pausing for a reply.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Nor +nobody else,” said the stripling vehemently. “A lot of +stiffs out on the coast, that’s all. Ginks nobody has ever +heard of, except Cyclone Mullins, and it took that false alarm +fifteen rounds to get a referee’s decision over <i>him. </i>The +boss would go and give him a chance against the champ, but I could +have told him that the legitimate contender was K-leg Binns. K-leg +put Cyclone Mullins out in the fifth. Well,” said the +office-boy in the overwrought tone of one chafing at human folly, “if +anybody thinks Bugs Butler can last six rounds with Lew Lucas, I’ve +two bucks right here in my vest pocket that says it ain’t so.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +began to see daylight.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +Bugs—Mr. Butler is one of the boxers in this fight that my +brother is interested in?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“That’s +right. He’s going up against the lightweight champ. Lew Lucas +is the lightweight champ. He’s a bird!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes?” +said Sally. This youth had a way of looking at her with his head +cocked on one side as though he expected her to say something.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +<i>sir!”</i> said the stripling with emphasis. “Lew +Lucas is a hot sketch. He used to live on the next street to me,” +he added as clinching evidence of his hero’s prowess. “I’ve +seen his old mother as close as I am to you. Say, I seen her a +hundred times. Is any stiff of a Bugs Butler going to lick a fellow +like that?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +doesn’t seem likely.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +spoke it!” said the lad crisply, striking unsuccessfully at a +fly which had settled on the blotting-paper.</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was a pause. Sally started to rise.</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +there’s another thing,” said the office-boy, loath to +close the subject. “Can Bugs Butler make a hundred and +thirty-five ringside without being weak?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +sounds awfully difficult.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“They +say he’s clever.” The expert laughed satirically. “Well, +what’s that going to get him? The poor fish can’t punch a +hole in a nut-sundae.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +don’t seem to like Mr. Butler.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +I’ve nothing against him,” said the office-boy +magnanimously. “I’m only saying he’s no licence to +be mixing it with Lew Lucas.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +got up. Absorbing as this chat on current form was, more important +matters claimed her attention.</p> + +<p class="normal">“How +shall I find my brother when I get to White Plains?” she asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +anybody’ll show you the way to the training-camp. If you +hurry, there’s a train you can make now.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Thank +you very much.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’re +welcome.”</p> + +<p class="normal">He +opened the door for her with an old-world politeness which disuse had +rendered a little rusty: then, with an air of getting back to +business after a pleasant but frivolous interlude, he took up the +paper-weights once more and placed the ruler with nice care on his +upturned chin.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">2</h3> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore +heaved a sigh of relief and began to sidle from the room. It was a +large room, half barn, half gymnasium. Athletic appliances of +various kinds hung on the walls and in the middle there was a wide +roped-off space, around which a small crowd had distributed itself +with an air of expectancy. This is a commercial age, and the days +when a prominent pugilist’s training activities used to be +hidden from the public gaze are over. To-day, if the public can lay +its hands on fifty cents, it may come and gaze its fill. This +afternoon, plutocrats to the number of about forty had assembled, +though not all of these, to the regret of Mr. Lester Burrowes, the +manager of the eminent Bugs Butler, had parted with solid coin. Many +of those present were newspaper representatives and on the free +list—writers who would polish up Mr. Butler’s somewhat +crude prognostications as to what he proposed to do to Mr. Lew Lucas, +and would report him as saying, “I am in really superb +condition and feel little apprehension of the issue,” and +artists who would depict him in a state of semi-nudity with feet +several sizes too large for any man.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +reason for Fillmore’s relief was that Mr. Burrowes, who was a +great talker and had buttonholed him a quarter of an hour ago, had at +last had his attention distracted elsewhere, and had gone off to +investigate some matter that called for his personal handling, +leaving Fillmore free to slide away to the hotel and get a bite to +eat, which he sorely needed. The zeal which had brought him to the +training-camp to inspect the final day of Mr. Butler’s +preparation—for the fight was to take place on the morrow—had +been so great that he had omitted to lunch before leaving New York.</p> + +<p class="normal">So +Fillmore made thankfully for the door. And it was at the door that +he encountered Sally. He was looking over his shoulder at the +moment, and was not aware of her presence till she spoke.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Hallo, +Fillmore!”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +had spoken softly, but a dynamite explosion could not have shattered +her brother’s composure with more completeness. In the leaping +twist which brought him facing her, he rose a clear three inches from +the floor. He had a confused sensation, as though his nervous system +had been stirred up with a pole. He struggled for breath and +moistened his lips with the tip of his tongue, staring at her +continuously during the process.</p> + +<p class="normal">Great +men, in their moments of weakness, are to be pitied rather than +scorned. If ever a man had an excuse for leaping like a young ram, +Fillmore had it. He had left Sally not much more than a week ago in +England, in Shropshire, at Monk’s Crofton. She had said +nothing of any intention on her part of leaving the country, the +county, or the house. Yet here she was, in Bugs Butler’s +training-camp at White Plains, in the State of New York, speaking +softly in his ear without even going through the preliminary of +tapping him on the shoulder to advertise her presence. No wonder +that Fillmore was startled. And no wonder that, as he adjusted his +faculties to the situation, there crept upon him a chill +apprehension.</p> + +<p class="normal">For +Fillmore had not been blind to the significance of that invitation to +Monk’s Crofton. Nowadays your wooer does not formally approach +a girl’s nearest relative and ask permission to pay his +addresses; but, when he invites her and that nearest relative to his +country home and collects all the rest of the family to meet her, the +thing may be said to have advanced beyond the realms of mere +speculation. Shrewdly Fillmore had deduced that Bruce Carmyle was in +love with Sally, and mentally he had joined their hands and given +them a brother’s blessing. And now it was only too plain that +disaster must have occurred. If the invitation could mean only one +thing, so also could Sally’s presence at White Plains mean only +one thing.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Sally!” +A croaking whisper was the best he could achieve. “What... +what... ?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Did +I startle you? I’m sorry.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +are you doing here? Why aren’t you at Monk’s Crofton?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +glanced past him at the ring and the crowd around it.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +decided I wanted to get back to America. Circumstances arose which +made it pleasanter to leave Monk’s Crofton.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do you mean to say... ?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes. + Don’t let’s talk about it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do +you mean to say,” persisted Fillmore, “that Carmyle +proposed to you and you turned him down?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +flushed.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t think it’s particularly nice to talk about that +sort of thing, but—yes.”</p> + +<p class="normal">A +feeling of desolation overcame Fillmore. That conviction, which +saddens us at all times, of the wilful bone-headedness of our fellows +swept coldly upon him. Everything had been so perfect, the whole +arrangement so ideal, that it had never occurred to him as a +possibility that Sally might take it into her head to spoil it by +declining to play the part allotted to her. The match was so +obviously the best thing that could happen. It was not merely the +suitor’s impressive wealth that made him hold this opinion, +though it would be idle to deny that the prospect of having a +brother-in-lawful claim on the Carmyle bank-balance had cast a rosy +glamour over the future as he had envisaged it. He honestly liked +and respected the man. He appreciated his quiet and aristocratic +reserve. A well-bred fellow, sensible withal, just the sort of +husband a girl like Sally needed. And now she had ruined everything. + With the capricious perversity which so characterizes her otherwise +delightful sex, she had spilled the beans.</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +why?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +Fill!” Sally had expected that realization of the facts would +produce these symptoms in him, but now that they had presented +themselves she was finding them rasping to the nerves. “I +should have thought the reason was obvious.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +mean you don’t like him?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t know whether I do or not. I certainly don’t like +him enough to marry him.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“He’s +a darned good fellow.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Is +he? You say so. I don’t know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +imperious desire for bodily sustenance began to compete successfully +for Fillmore’s notice with his spiritual anguish.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Let’s +go to the hotel and talk it over. We’ll go to the hotel and +I’ll give you something to eat.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t want anything to eat, thanks.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +don’t want anything to eat?” said Fillmore incredulously. + He supposed in a vague sort of way that there were eccentric people +of this sort, but it was hard to realize that he had met one of them. + “I’m starving.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +run along then.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +but I want to talk...”</p> + +<p class="normal">He +was not the only person who wanted to talk. At the moment a small +man of sporting exterior hurried up. He wore what his tailor’s +advertisements would have called a “nobbly” suit of +checked tweed and—in defiance of popular prejudice—a +brown bowler hat. Mr. Lester Burrowes, having dealt with the +business which had interrupted their conversation a few minutes +before, was anxious to resume his remarks on the subject of the +supreme excellence in every respect of his young charge.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Say, +Mr. Nicholas, you ain’t going’? Bugs is just getting +ready to spar.”</p> + +<p class="normal">He +glanced inquiringly at Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">“My +sister—Mr. Burrowes,” said Fillmore faintly. “Mr. +Burrowes is Bugs Butler’s manager.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“How +do you do?” said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Pleased +to meecher,” said Mr. Burrowes. “Say...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +was just going to the hotel to get something to eat,” said +Fillmore.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Burrowes clutched at his coat-button with a swoop, and held him with +a glittering eye.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +but, say, before-you-go-lemme-tell-ya-somef’n. You’ve +never seen this boy of mine, not when he was feeling <i>right. +</i>Believe me, he’s there! He’s a wizard. He’s a +Hindoo! Say, he’s been practising up a left shift that...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore’s +eye met Sally’s wanly, and she pitied him. Presently she would +require him to explain to her how he had dared to dismiss Ginger from +his employment—and make that explanation a good one: but in the +meantime she remembered that he was her brother and was suffering.</p> + +<p class="normal">“He’s +the cleverest lightweight,” proceeded Mr. Burrowes fervently, +“since Joe Gans. I’m telling you and I <i>know! </i>He...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Can +he make a hundred and thirty-five ringside without being weak?” +asked Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +effect of this simple question on Mr. Burrowes was stupendous. He +dropped away from Fillmore’s coat-button like an exhausted +bivalve, and his small mouth opened feebly. It was as if a child had +suddenly propounded to an eminent mathematician some abstruse problem +in the higher algebra. Females who took an interest in boxing had +come into Mr. Burrowes’ life before—-in his younger days, +when he was a famous featherweight, the first of his three wives had +been accustomed to sit at the ringside during his contests and urge +him in language of the severest technicality to knock opponents’ +blocks off—but somehow he had not supposed from her appearance +and manner that Sally was one of the elect. He gaped at her, and the +relieved Fillmore sidled off like a bird hopping from the compelling +gaze of a snake. He was not quite sure that he was acting correctly +in allowing his sister to roam at large among the somewhat Bohemian +surroundings of a training-camp, but the instinct of +self-preservation turned the scale. He had breakfasted early, and if +he did not eat right speedily it seemed to him that dissolution would +set in.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Whazzat?” +said Mr. Burrowes feebly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +took him fifteen rounds to get a referee’s decision over +Cyclone Mullins,” said Sally severely, “and K-leg +Binns...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Burrowes rallies.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +ain’t got it <i>right”</i> he protested. “Say, you +mustn’t believe what you see in the papers. The referee was +dead against us, and Cyclone was down once for all of half a minute +and they wouldn’t count him out. Gee! You got to <i>kill</i> a +guy in some towns before they’ll give you a decision. At that, +they couldn’t do nothing so raw as make it anything but a win +for my boy, after him leading by a mile all the way. Have you ever +<i>seen</i> Bugs, ma’am?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +had to admit that she had not had that privilege. Mr. Burrowes with +growing excitement felt in his breastpocket and produced a +picture-postcard, which he thrust into her hand.</p> + +<p class="normal">“That’s +Bugs,” he said. “Take a slant at that and then tell me +if he don’t look the goods.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +photograph represented a young man in the irreducible minimum of +clothing who crouched painfully, as though stricken with one of the +acuter forms of gastritis.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ll +call him over and have him sign it for you,” said Mr. Burrowes, +before Sally had had time to grasp the fact that this work of art was +a gift and no mere loan. “Here, Bugs—wantcher.”</p> + +<p class="normal">A +youth enveloped in a bath-robe, who had been talking to a group of +admirers near the ring, turned, started languidly towards them, then, +seeing Sally, quickened his pace. He was an admirer of the sex.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Burrowes did the honours.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Bugs, +this is Miss Nicholas, come to see you work out. I have been telling +her she’s going to have a treat.” And to Sally. “Shake +hands with Bugs Butler, ma’am, the coming lightweight champion +of the world.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Butler’s photograph, Sally considered, had flattered him. He +was, in the flesh, a singularly repellent young man. There was a +mean and cruel curve to his lips and a cold arrogance in his eye; a +something dangerous and sinister in the atmosphere he radiated. +Moreover, she did not like the way he smirked at her.</p> + +<p class="normal">However, +she exerted herself to be amiable.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +hope you are going to win, Mr. Butler,” she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +smile which she forced as she spoke the words removed the coming +champion’s doubts, though they had never been serious. He was +convinced now that he had made a hit. He always did, he reflected, +with the girls. It was something about him. His chest swelled +complacently beneath the bath-robe.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +betcher,” he asserted briefly.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Burrows looked at his watch.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Time +you were starting, Bugs.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +coming champion removed his gaze from Sally’s face, into which +he had been peering in a conquering manner, and cast a disparaging +glance at the audience. It was far from being as large as he could +have wished, and at least a third of it was composed of non-payers +from the newspapers.</p> + +<p class="normal">“All +right,” he said, bored.</p> + +<p class="normal">His +languor left him, as his gaze fell on Sally again, and his spirits +revived somewhat. After all, small though the numbers of spectators +might be, bright eyes would watch and admire him.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ll +go a couple of rounds with Reddy for a starter,” he said. +“Seen him anywheres? He’s never around when he’s +wanted.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ll +fetch him,” said Mr. Burrowes. “He’s back there +somewheres.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +going to show that guy up this afternoon,” said Mr. Butler +coldly. “He’s been getting too fresh.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +manager bustled off, and Bugs Butler, with a final smirk, left Sally +and dived under the ropes. There was a stir of interest in the +audience, though the newspaper men, blasé through familiarity, +exhibited no emotion. Presently Mr. Burrowes reappeared, shepherding +a young man whose face was hidden by the sweater which he was pulling +over his head. He was a sturdily built young man. The sweater, +moving from his body, revealed a good pair of shoulders.</p> + +<p class="normal">A +last tug, and the sweater was off. Red hair flashed into view, +tousled and disordered: and, as she saw it, Sally uttered an +involuntary gasp of astonishment which caused many eyes to turn +towards her. And the red-headed young man, who had been stooping to +pick up his gloves, straightened himself with a jerk and stood +staring at her blankly and incredulously, his face slowly crimsoning. +</p> + +<h3 class="sect">3</h3> + +<p class="normal">It +was the energetic Mr. Burrowes who broke the spell.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Come +on, come on,” he said impatiently. “Li’l speed +there, Reddy.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +Kemp started like a sleep-walker awakened; then recovering himself, +slowly began to pull on the gloves. Embarrassment was stamped on his +agreeable features. His face matched his hair.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +plucked at the little manager’s elbow. He turned irritably, +but beamed in a distrait sort of manner when he perceived the source +of the interruption.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Who—him?” +he said in answer to Sally’s whispered question. “He’s +just one of Bugs’ sparring-partners.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Burrowes, fussy now that the time had come for action, interrupted +her.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’ll +excuse me, miss, but I have to hold the watch. We mustn’t +waste any time.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +drew back. She felt like an infidel who intrudes upon the +celebration of strange rites. This was Man’s hour, and women +must keep in the background. She had the sensation of being very +small and yet very much in the way, like a puppy who has wandered +into a church. The novelty and solemnity of the scene awed her.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +looked at Ginger, who with averted gaze was fiddling with his clothes +in the opposite corner of the ring. He was as removed from +communication as if he had been in another world. She continued to +stare, wide-eyed, and Ginger, shuffling his feet self-consciously, +plucked at his gloves.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Butler, meanwhile, having doffed his bath-robe, stretched himself, +and with leisurely nonchalance put on a second pair of gloves, was +filling in the time with a little shadow boxing. He moved +rhythmically to and fro, now ducking his head, now striking out with +his muffled hands, and a sickening realization of the man’s +animal power swept over Sally and turned her cold. Swathed in his +bath-robe, Bugs Butler had conveyed an atmosphere of dangerousness: +in the boxing-tights which showed up every rippling muscle, he was +horrible and sinister, a machine built for destruction, a human +panther.</p> + +<p class="normal">So +he appeared to Sally, but a stout and bulbous eyed man standing at +her side was not equally impressed. Obviously one of the Wise Guys +of whom her friend the sporting office-boy had spoken, he was frankly +dissatisfied with the exhibition.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Shadow-boxing,” +he observed in a cavilling spirit to his companion. “Yes, he +can do that all right, just like I can fox-trot if I ain’t got +a partner to get in the way. But one good wallop, and then watch +him.”</p> + +<p class="normal">His +friend, also plainly a guy of established wisdom, assented with a +curt nod.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ah!” +he agreed.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Lew +Lucas,” said the first wise guy, “is just as shifty, and +he can punch.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ah!” +said the second wise guy.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Just +because he beats up a few poor mutts of sparring-partners,” +said the first wise guy disparagingly, “he thinks he’s +someone.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ah!” +said the second wise guy.</p> + +<p class="normal">As +far as Sally could interpret these remarks, the full meaning of which +was shrouded from her, they seemed to be reassuring. For a +comforting moment she ceased to regard Ginger as a martyr waiting to +be devoured by a lion. Mr. Butler, she gathered, was not so +formidable as he appeared. But her relief was not to be long-lived.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Of +course he’ll eat this red-headed gink,” went on the first +wise guy. “That’s the thing he does best, killing his +sparring-partners. But Lew Lucas...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +was not interested in Lew Lucas. That numbing fear had come back to +her. Even these cognoscenti, little as they esteemed Mr. Butler, had +plainly no doubts as to what he would do to Ginger. She tried to +tear herself away, but something stronger than her own will kept her +there standing where she was, holding on to the rope and staring +forlornly into the ring.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ready, +Bugs?” asked Mr. Burrowes.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +coming champion nodded carelessly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Go +to it,” said Mr. Burrowes.</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +ceased to pluck at his gloves and advanced into the ring.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">4</h3> + +<p class="normal">Of +all the learned professions, pugilism is the one in which the trained +expert is most sharply divided from the mere dabbler. In other +fields the amateur may occasionally hope to compete successfully with +the man who has made a business of what is to him but a sport, but at +boxing never: and the whole demeanour of Bugs Butler showed that he +had laid this truth to heart. It would be too little to say that his +bearing was confident: he comported himself with the care-free +jauntiness of an infant about to demolish a Noah’s Ark with a +tack-hammer. Cyclone Mullinses might withstand him for fifteen +rounds where they yielded to a K-leg Binns in the fifth, but, when it +came to beating up a sparring-partner and an amateur at that, Bugs +Butler knew his potentialities. He was there forty ways and he did +not attempt to conceal it. Crouching as was his wont, he uncoiled +himself like a striking rattlesnake and flicked Ginger lightly over +his guard. Then he returned to his crouch and circled sinuously +about the ring with the amiable intention of showing the crowd, +payers and deadheads alike, what real footwork was. If there was one +thing on which Bugs Butler prided himself, it was footwork.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +adverb “lightly” is a relative term, and the blow which +had just planted a dull patch on Ginger’s cheekbone affected +those present in different degrees. Ginger himself appeared stolidly +callous. Sally shuddered to the core of her being and had to hold +more tightly to the rope to support herself. The two wise guys +mocked openly. To the wise guys, expert connoisseurs of swat, the +thing had appeared richly farcical. They seemed to consider the +blow, administered to a third party and not to themselves, hardly +worth calling a blow at all. Two more, landing as quickly and neatly +as the first, left them equally cold.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Call +that punching?” said the first wise guy.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ah!” +said the second wise guy.</p> + +<p class="normal">But +Mr. Butler, if he heard this criticism—and it is probable that +he did—for the wise ones had been restrained by no delicacy of +feeling from raising their voices, was in no way discommoded by it. +Bugs Butler knew what he was about. Bright eyes were watching him, +and he meant to give them a treat. The girls like smooth work. Any +roughneck could sail into a guy and knock the daylights out of him, +but how few could be clever and flashy and scientific? Few, few, +indeed, thought Mr. Butler as he slid in and led once more.</p> + +<p class="normal">Something +solid smote Mr. Butler’s nose, rocking him on to his heels and +inducing an unpleasant smarting sensation about his eyes. He backed +away and regarded Ginger with astonishment, almost with pain. Until +this moment he had scarcely considered him as an active participant +in the scene at all, and he felt strongly that this sort of thing was +bad form. It was not being done by sparring-partners.</p> + +<p class="normal">A +juster man might have reflected that he himself was to blame. He had +undeniably been careless. In the very act of leading he had allowed +his eyes to flicker sideways to see how Sally was taking this +exhibition of science, and he had paid the penalty. Nevertheless, he +was piqued. He shimmered about the ring, thinking it over. And the +more he thought it over, the less did he approve of his young +assistant’s conduct. Hard thoughts towards Ginger began to +float in his mind.</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger, +too, was thinking hard thoughts. He had not had an easy time since +he had come to the training camp, but never till to-day had he +experienced any resentment towards his employer. Until this +afternoon Bugs Butler had pounded him honestly and without malice, +and he had gone through it, as the other sparring-partners did, +phlegmatically, taking it as part of the day’s work. But this +afternoon there had been a difference. Those careless flicks had +been an insult, a deliberate offence. The man was trying to make a +fool of him, playing to the gallery: and the thought of who was in +that gallery inflamed Ginger past thought of consequences. No one, +not even Mr. Butler, was more keenly alive than he to the fact that +in a serious conflict with a man who to-morrow night might be +light-weight champion of the world he stood no chance whatever: but +he did not intend to be made an exhibition of in front of Sally +without doing something to hold his end up. He proposed to go down +with his flag flying, and in pursuance of this object he dug Mr. +Butler heavily in the lower ribs with his right, causing that expert +to clinch and the two wise guys to utter sharp barking sounds +expressive of derision.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Say, +what the hell d’ya think you’re getting at?” +demanded the aggrieved pugilist in a heated whisper in Ginger’s +ear as they fell into the embrace. “What’s the idea, you +jelly bean?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +maintained a pink silence. His jaw was set, and the temper which +Nature had bestowed upon him to go with his hair had reached white +heat. He dodged a vicious right which whizzed up at his chin out of +the breaking clinch, and rushed. A left hook shook him, but was too +high to do more. There was rough work in the far corner, and +suddenly with startling abruptness Bugs Butler, bothered by the ropes +at his back and trying to side-step, ran into a swing and fell.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Time!” +shouted the scandalized Mr. Burrowes, utterly aghast at this +frightful misadventure. In the whole course of his professional +experience he could recall no such devastating occurrence.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +audience was no less startled. There was audible gasping. The +newspaper men looked at each other with a wild surmise and conjured +up pleasant pictures of their sporting editors receiving this +sensational item of news later on over the telephone. The two wise +guys, continuing to pursue Mr. Butler with their dislike, emitted +loud and raucous laughs, and one of them, forming his hands into a +megaphone, urged the fallen warrior to go away and get a rep. As for +Sally, she was conscious of a sudden, fierce, cave-womanly rush of +happiness which swept away completely the sickening qualms of the +last few minutes. Her teeth were clenched and her eyes blazed with +joyous excitement. She looked at Ginger yearningly, longing to +forget a gentle upbringing and shout congratulation to him. She was +proud of him. And mingled with the pride was a curious feeling that +was almost fear. This was not the mild and amiable young man whom +she was wont to mother through the difficulties of a world in which +he was unfitted to struggle for himself. This was a new Ginger, a +stranger to her.</p> + +<p class="normal">On +the rare occasions on which he had been knocked down in the past, it +had been Bugs Butler’s canny practice to pause for a while and +rest before rising and continuing the argument, but now he was up +almost before he had touched the boards, and the satire of the second +wise guy, who had begun to saw the air with his hand and count +loudly, lost its point. It was only too plain that Mr. Butler’s +motto was that a man may be down, but he is never out. And, indeed, +the knock-down had been largely a stumble. Bugs Butler’s +educated feet, which had carried him unscathed through so many +contests, had for this single occasion managed to get themselves +crossed just as Ginger’s blow landed, and it was to his lack of +balance rather than the force of the swing that his downfall had been +due.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Time!” +he snarled, casting a malevolent side-glance at his manager. “Like +hell it’s time!”</p> + +<p class="normal">And +in a whirlwind of flying gloves he flung himself upon Ginger, driving +him across the ring, while Mr. Burrowes, watch in hand, stared with +dropping jaw. If Ginger had seemed a new Ginger to Sally, still more +did this seem a new Bugs Butler to Mr. Burrowes, and the manager +groaned in spirit. Coolness, skill and science—these had been +the qualities in his protégé which had always so +endeared him to Mr. Lester Burrowes and had so enriched their +respective bank accounts: and now, on the eve of the most important +fight in his life, before an audience of newspaper men, he had thrown +them all aside and was making an exhibition of himself with a common +sparring-partner.</p> + +<p class="normal">That +was the bitter blow to Mr. Burrowes. Had this lapse into the +unscientific primitive happened in a regular fight, he might have +mourned and poured reproof into Bug’s ear when he got him back +in his corner at the end of the round; but he would not have +experienced this feeling of helpless horror—the sort of horror +an elder of the church might feel if he saw his favourite bishop +yielding in public to the fascination of jazz. It was the fact that +Bugs Butler was lowering himself to extend his powers against a +sparring-partner that shocked Mr. Burrowes. There is an etiquette in +these things. A champion may batter his sparring-partners into +insensibility if he pleases, but he must do it with nonchalance. He +must not appear to be really trying.</p> + +<p class="normal">And +nothing could be more manifest than that Bugs Butler was trying. His +whole fighting soul was in his efforts to corner Ginger and destroy +him. The battle was raging across the ring and down the ring, and up +the ring and back again; yet always Ginger, like a storm-driven ship, +contrived somehow to weather the tempest. Out of the flurry of +swinging arms he emerged time after time bruised, bleeding, but +fighting hard.</p> + +<p class="normal">For +Bugs Butler’s fury was defeating its object. Had he remained +his cool and scientific self, he could have demolished Ginger and cut +through his defence in a matter of seconds. But he had lapsed back +into the methods of his unskilled novitiate. He swung and missed, +swung and missed again, struck but found no vital spot. And now +there was blood on his face, too. In some wild mêlée +the sacred fount had been tapped, and his teeth gleamed through a +crimson mist.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +Wise Guys were beyond speech. They were leaning against one another, +punching each other feebly in the back. One was crying.</p> + +<p class="normal">And +then suddenly the end came, as swiftly and unexpectedly as the thing +had begun. His wild swings had tired Bugs Butler, and with fatigue +prudence returned to him. His feet began once more their subtle +weaving in and out. Twice his left hand flickered home. A quick +feint, a short, jolting stab, and Ginger’s guard was down and +he was swaying in the middle of the ring, his hands hanging and his +knees a-quiver.</p> + +<p class="normal">Bugs +Butler measured his distance, and Sally shut her eyes.</p> + + +<h3 class="chap">CHAPTER XIV</h3> + +<h3 class="titl">MR. ABRAHAMS RE-ENGAGES AN OLD EMPLOYEE</h3> + +<h3 class="sect">1</h3> + +<p class="normal">The +only real happiness, we are told, is to be obtained by bringing +happiness to others. Bugs Butler’s mood, accordingly, when +some thirty hours after the painful episode recorded in the last +chapter he awoke from a state of coma in the ring at Jersey City to +discover that Mr. Lew Lucas had knocked him out in the middle of the +third round, should have been one of quiet contentment. His +inability to block a short left-hook followed by a right to the point +of the jaw had ameliorated quite a number of existences.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Lew Lucas, for one, was noticeably pleased. So were Mr. Lucas’s +seconds, one of whom went so far as to kiss him. And most of the +crowd, who had betted heavily on the champion, were delighted. Yet +Bugs Butler did not rejoice. It is not too much to say that his +peevish bearing struck a jarring note in the general gaiety. A heavy +frown disfigured his face as he slouched from the ring.</p> + +<p class="normal">But +the happiness which he had spread went on spreading. The two Wise +Guys, who had been unable to attend the fight in person, received the +result on the ticker and exuberantly proclaimed themselves the richer +by five hundred dollars. The pimpled office-boy at the Fillmore +Nicholas Theatrical Enterprises Ltd. caused remark in the Subway by +whooping gleefully when he read the news in his morning paper, for +he, too, had been rendered wealthier by the brittleness of Mr. +Butler’s chin. And it was with fierce satisfaction that Sally, +breakfasting in her little apartment, informed herself through the +sporting page of the details of the contender’s downfall. She +was not a girl who disliked many people, but she had acquired a +lively distaste for Bugs Butler.</p> + +<p class="normal">Lew +Lucas seemed a man after her own heart. If he had been a personal +friend of Ginger’s he could not, considering the brief time at +his disposal, have avenged him with more thoroughness. In round one +he had done all sorts of diverting things to Mr. Butler’s left +eye: in round two he had continued the good work on that gentleman’s +body; and in round three he had knocked him out. Could anyone have +done more? Sally thought not, and she drank Lew Lucas’s health +in a cup of coffee and hoped his old mother was proud of him.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +telephone bell rang at her elbow. She unhooked the receiver.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Hullo?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +hullo,” said a voice.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ginger!” +cried Sally delightedly. +</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +say, I’m awfully glad you’re back. I only got your +letter this morning. Found it at the boarding-house. I happened to +look in there and...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ginger,” +interrupted Sally, “your voice is music, but I want to <i>see</i> +you. Where are you?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +at a chemist’s shop across the street. I was wondering if...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Come +here at once!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +say, may I? I was just going to ask.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +miserable creature, why haven’t you been round to see me +before?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +as a matter of fact, I haven’t been going about much for the +last day. You see...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +know. Of course.” Quick sympathy came into Sally’s +voice. She gave a sidelong glance of approval and gratitude at the +large picture of Lew Lucas which beamed up at her from the morning +paper. “You poor thing! How are you?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +all right, thanks.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +hurry.”</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was a slight pause at the other end of the wire.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +say.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +not much to look at, you know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +never were. Stop talking and hurry over.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +mean to say...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +hung up the receiver firmly. She waited eagerly for some minutes, +and then footsteps came along the passage. They stopped at her door +and the bell rang. Sally ran to the door, flung it open, and +recoiled in consternation.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +Ginger!”</p> + +<p class="normal">He +had stated the facts accurately when he had said that he was not much +to look at. He gazed at her devotedly out of an unblemished right +eye, but the other was hidden altogether by a puffy swelling of dull +purple. A great bruise marred his left cheek-bone, and he spoke with +some difficulty through swollen lips.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +all <i>right,</i> you know,” he assured her.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +isn’t. It’s awful! Oh, you poor darling!” She +clenched her teeth viciously. “I wish he had killed him!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Eh?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +wish Lew Lucas or whatever his name is had murdered him. Brute!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +I don’t know, you know.” Ginger’s sense of fairness +compelled him to defend his late employer against these harsh +sentiments. “He isn’t a bad sort of chap, really. Bugs +Butler, I mean.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do +you seriously mean to stand there and tell me you don’t loathe +the creature?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +he’s all right. See his point of view and all that. Can’t +blame him, if you come to think of it, for getting the wind up a bit +in the circs. Bit thick, I mean to say, a sparring-partner going at +him like that. Naturally he didn’t think it much of a wheeze. +It was my fault right along. Oughtn’t to have done it, of +course, but somehow, when he started making an ass of me and I knew +you were looking on... well, it seemed a good idea to have a dash at +doing something on my own. No right to, of course. A +sparring-partner isn’t supposed...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Sit +down,” said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +sat down.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ginger,” +said Sally, “you’re too good to live.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +I say!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +believe if someone sandbagged you and stole your watch and chain +you’d say there were faults on both sides or something. I’m +just a cat, and I say I wish your beast of a Bugs Butler had perished +miserably. I’d have gone and danced on his grave... But +whatever made you go in for that sort of thing?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +it seemed the only job that was going at the moment. I’ve +always done a goodish bit of boxing and I was very fit and so on, and +it looked to me rather an opening. Gave me something to get along +with. You get paid quite fairly decently, you know, and it’s +rather a jolly life...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Jolly? +Being hammered about like that?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +you don’t notice it much. I’ve always enjoyed scrapping +rather. And, you see, when your brother gave me the push...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +uttered an exclamation.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +an extraordinary thing it is—I went all the way out to White +Plains that afternoon to find Fillmore and tackle him about that and +I didn’t say a word about it. And I haven’t seen or been +able to get hold of him since.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No? +Busy sort of cove, your brother.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why +did Fillmore let you go?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Let +me go? Oh, you mean... well, there was a sort of mix-up. A kind of +misunderstanding.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +happened?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +it was nothing. Just a...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +happened?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger’s +disfigured countenance betrayed embarrassment. He looked awkwardly +about the room.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +not worth talking about.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +<i>is</i> worth talking about. I’ve a right to know. It was I +who sent you to Fillmore...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Now +<i>that,”</i> said Ginger, “was jolly decent of you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Don’t +interrupt! I sent you to Fillmore, and he had no business to let you +go without saying a word to me. What happened?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +twiddled his fingers unhappily.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +it was rather unfortunate. You see, his wife—I don’t +know if you know her?...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Of +course I know her.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why, +yes, you would, wouldn’t you? Your brother’s wife, I +mean,” said Ginger acutely. “Though, as a matter of +fact, you often find sisters-in-law who won’t have anything to +do with one another. I know a fellow...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ginger,” +said Sally, “it’s no good your thinking you can get out +of telling me by rambling off on other subjects. I’m grim and +resolute and relentless, and I mean to get this story out of you if I +have to use a corkscrew. Fillmore’s wife, you were saying...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +came back reluctantly to the main theme.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +she came into the office one morning, and we started fooling +about...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Fooling +about?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +kind of chivvying each other.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Chivvying?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“At +least<i> I</i> was.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +were what?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Sort +of chasing her a bit, you know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +regarded this apostle of frivolity with amazement.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +<i>do</i> you mean?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger’s +embarrassment increased.</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +thing was, you see, she happened to trickle in rather quietly when I +happened to be looking at something, and I didn’t know she was +there till she suddenly grabbed it...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Grabbed +what?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +thing. The thing I happened to be looking at. She bagged it... +collared it... took it away from me, you know, and wouldn’t +give it back and generally started to rot about a bit, so I rather +began to chivvy her to some extent, and I’d just caught her +when your brother happened to roll in. I suppose,” said +Ginger, putting two and two together, “he had really come with +her to the office and had happened to hang back for a minute or two, +to talk to somebody or something... well, of course, he was +considerably fed to see me apparently doing jiu-jitsu with his wife. +Enough to rattle any man, if you come to think of it,” said +Ginger, ever fair-minded. “Well, he didn’t say anything +at the time, but a bit later in the day he called me in and +administered the push.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +shook her head.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +sounds the craziest story to me. What was it that Mrs. Fillmore took +from you?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +just something.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +rapped the table imperiously.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ginger!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +as a matter of fact,” said her goaded visitor, “It was a +photograph.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Who +of? Or, if you’re particular, of whom?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well... +you, to be absolutely accurate.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Me?” +Sally stared. “But I’ve never given you a photograph of +myself.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger’s +face was a study in scarlet and purple.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +didn’t exactly <i>give</i> it to me,” he mumbled. “When +I say give, I mean...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Good +gracious!” Sudden enlightenment came upon Sally. “That +photograph we were hunting for when I first came here! Had you stolen +it all the time?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why, +yes, I did sort of pinch it...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +fraud! You humbug! And you pretended to help me look for it.” +She gazed at him almost with respect. “I never knew you were +so deep and snaky. I’m discovering all sorts of new things +about you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was a brief silence. Ginger, confession over, seemed a trifle +happier.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +hope you’re not frightfully sick about it?” he said at +length. “It was lying about, you know, and I rather felt I +must have it. Hadn’t the cheek to ask you for it, so...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Don’t +apologize,” said Sally cordially. “Great compliment. So +I have caused your downfall again, have I? I’m certainly your +evil genius, Ginger. I’m beginning to feel like a regular rag +and a bone and a hank of hair. First I egged you on to insult your +family—oh, by the way, I want to thank you about that. Now +that I’ve met your Uncle Donald I can see how public-spirited +you were. I ruined your prospects there, and now my fatal beauty— +cabinet size—has led to your destruction once more. It’s +certainly up to me to find you another job, I can see that.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +really, I say, you mustn’t bother. I shall be all right.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +my duty. Now what is there that you really <i>can</i> do? Burglary, +of course, but it’s not respectable. You’ve tried being +a waiter and a prize-fighter and a right-hand man, and none of those +seems to be just right. Can’t you suggest anything?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +shook his head.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +shall wangle something, I expect.” ‘</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +but what? It must be something good this time. I don’t want to +be walking along Broadway and come on you suddenly as a +street-cleaner. I don’t want to send for an express-man and +find you popping up. My idea would be to go to my bank to arrange an +overdraft and be told the president could give me two minutes and +crawl in humbly and find you prezzing away to beat the band in a big +chair. Isn’t there anything in the world that you can do +that’s solid and substantial and will keep you out of the +poor-house in your old age? Think!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Of +course, if I had a bit of capital...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ah! +The business man! And what,” inquired Sally, “would you +do, Mr. Morgan, if you had a bit of capital?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Run +a dog-thingummy,” said Ginger promptly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What’s +a dog-thingummy?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why, +a thingamajig. For dogs, you know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +nodded.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +a thingamajig for dogs? Now I understand. You will put things so +obscurely at first. Ginger, you poor fish, what are you raving +about? What on earth is a thingamajig for dogs?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +mean a sort of place like fellows have. Breeding dogs, you know, and +selling them and winning prizes and all that. There are lots of them +about.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +a <i>kennels?”</i></p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +a kennels.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +a weird mind you have, Ginger. You couldn’t say kennels at +first, could you? That wouldn’t have made it difficult enough. +I suppose, if anyone asked you where you had your lunch, you would +say, ‘Oh, at a thingamajig for mutton chops’... Ginger, +my lad, there is something in this. I believe for the first time in +our acquaintance you have spoken something very nearly resembling a +mouthful. You’re wonderful with dogs, aren’t you?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +dashed keen on them, and I’ve studied them a bit. As a matter +of fact, though it seems rather like swanking, there isn’t much +about dogs that I don’t know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Of +course. I believe you’re a sort of honorary dog yourself. I +could tell it by the way you stopped that fight at Roville. You +plunged into a howling mass of about a million hounds of all species +and just whispered in their ears and they stopped at once. Why, the +more one examines this, the better it looks. I do believe it’s +the one thing you couldn’t help making a success of. It’s +very paying, isn’t it?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Works +out at about a hundred per cent on the original outlay, I’ve +been told.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“A +hundred per cent? That sounds too much like something of Fillmore’s +for comfort. Let’s say ninety-nine and be conservative. +Ginger, you have hit it. Say no more. You shall be the Dog King, +the biggest thingamajigger for dogs in the country. But how do you +start?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +as a matter of fact, while I was up at White Plains, I ran into a +cove who had a place of the sort and wanted to sell out. That was +what made me think of it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +must start to-day. Or early to-morrow.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes,” +said Ginger doubtfully. “Of course, there’s the catch, +you know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +catch?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +capital. You’ve got to have that. This fellow wouldn’t +sell out under five thousand dollars.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ll +lend you five thousand dollars.” +</p> + +<p class="normal">“No!” +said Ginger.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +looked at him with exasperation. “Ginger, I’d like to +slap you,” she said. It was maddening, this intrusion of +sentiment into business affairs. Why, simply because he was a man +and she was a woman, should she be restrained from investing money in +a sound commercial undertaking? If Columbus had taken up this +bone-headed stand towards Queen Isabella, America would never have +been discovered.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +can’t take five thousand dollars off you,” said Ginger +firmly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Who’s +talking of taking it off me, as you call it?” stormed Sally. +“Can’t you forget your burglarious career for a second? +This isn’t the same thing as going about stealing defenceless +girls’ photographs. This is business. I think you would make +an enormous success of a dog-place, and you admit you’re +good, so why make frivolous objections? Why shouldn’t I put +money into a good thing? Don’t you want me to get rich, or what +is it?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +was becoming confused. Argument had never been his strong point.</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +it’s such a lot of money.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“To +you, perhaps. Not to me. I’m a plutocrat. Five thousand +dollars! What’s five thousand dollars? I feed it to the birds.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +pondered woodenly for a while. His was a literal mind, and he knew +nothing of Sally’s finances beyond the fact that when he had +first met her she had come into a legacy of some kind. Moreover, he +had been hugely impressed by Fillmore’s magnificence. It +seemed plain enough that the Nicholases were a wealthy family.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t like it, you know,” he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +don’t have to like it,” said Sally. “You just do +it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">A +consoling thought flashed upon Ginger.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’d +have to let me pay you interest.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Let +you? My lad, you’ll <i>have</i> to pay me interest. What do +you think this is—a round game? It’s a cold business +deal.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Topping!” +said Ginger relieved. “How about twenty-five per cent.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Don’t +be silly,” said Sally quickly. “I want three.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +that’s all rot,” protested Ginger. “I mean to say— +three. I don’t,” he went on, making a concession, “mind +saying twenty.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +you insist, I’ll make it five. Not more.” +</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +ten, then?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Five!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Suppose,” +said Ginger insinuatingly, “I said seven?” +</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +never saw anyone like you for haggling,” said Sally with +disapproval. “Listen! Six. And that’s my last word.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Six?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Six.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +did sums in his head.</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +that would only work out at three hundred dollars a year. It isn’t +enough.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +do you know about it? As if I hadn’t been handling this sort of +deal in my life. Six! Do you agree?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +suppose so.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Then +that’s settled. Is this man you talk about in New York?” + +</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +he’s down on Long Island at a place on the south shore.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +mean, can you get him on the ‘phone and clinch the thing?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +yes. I know his address, and I suppose his number’s in the +book.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Then +go off at once and settle with him before somebody else snaps him up. + Don’t waste a minute.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +paused at the door.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +say, you’re absolutely sure about this?’’’</p> + +<p class="normal">“Of +course.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +mean to say...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Get +on,” said Sally.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">2</h3> + +<p class="normal">The +window of Sally’s sitting-room looked out on to a street which, +while not one of the city’s important arteries, was capable, +nevertheless, of affording a certain amount of entertainment to the +observer: and after Ginger had left, she carried the morning paper to +the window-sill and proceeded to divide her attention between a third +reading of the fight-report and a lazy survey of the outer world. It +was a beautiful day, and the outer world was looking its best.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +had not been at her post for many minutes when a taxi-cab stopped at +the apartment-house, and she was surprised and interested to see her +brother Fillmore heave himself out of the interior. He paid the +driver, and the cab moved off, leaving him on the sidewalk casting a +large shadow in the sunshine. Sally was on the point of calling to +him, when his behaviour became so odd that astonishment checked her.</p> + +<p class="normal">From +where she sat Fillmore had all the appearance of a man practising the +steps of a new dance, and sheer curiosity as to what he would do next +kept Sally watching in silence. First, he moved in a resolute sort +of way towards the front door; then, suddenly stopping, scuttled +back. This movement he repeated twice, after which he stood in deep +thought before making another dash for the door, which, like the +others, came to an abrupt end as though he had run into some +invisible obstacle. And, finally, wheeling sharply, he bustled off +down the street and was lost to view.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +could make nothing of it. If Fillmore had taken the trouble to come +in a taxi-cab, obviously to call upon her, why had he abandoned the +idea at her very threshold? She was still speculating on this mystery +when the telephone-bell rang, and her brother’s voice spoke +huskily in her ear.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Sally?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Hullo, +Fill. What are you going to call it?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +am I... Call what?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +dance you were doing outside here just now. It’s your own +invention, isn’t it?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Did +you see me?” said Fillmore, upset.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Of +course I saw you. I was fascinated.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I—er—I +was coming to have a talk with you. Sally...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Fillmore’s +voice trailed off.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +why didn’t you?”</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was a pause—on Fillmore’s part, if the timbre of at his +voice correctly indicated his feelings, a pause of discomfort. +Something was plainly vexing Fillmore’s great mind.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Sally,” +he said at last, and coughed hollowly into the receiver.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I—that +is to say, I have asked Gladys... Gladys will be coming to see you +very shortly. Will you be in?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ll +stay in. How is Gladys? I’m longing to see her again.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“She +is very well. A trifle—a little upset.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Upset? +What about?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“She +will tell you when she arrives. I have just been ‘phoning to +her. She is coming at once.” There was another pause. “I’m +afraid she has bad news.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +news?”</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was silence at the other end of the wire.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +news?” repeated Sally, a little sharply. She hated mysteries.</p> + +<p class="normal">But +Fillmore had rung off. Sally hung up the receiver thoughtfully. She +was puzzled and anxious. However, there being nothing to be gained +by worrying, she carried the breakfast things into the kitchen and +tried to divert herself by washing up. Presently a ring at the +door-bell brought her out, to find her sister-in-law.</p> + +<p class="normal">Marriage, +even though it had brought with it the lofty position of partnership +with the Hope of the American Stage, had effected no noticeable +alteration in the former Miss Winch. As Mrs. Fillmore she was the +same square, friendly creature. She hugged Sally in a muscular +manner and went on in the sitting-room.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +it’s great seeing you again,” she said. “I began +to think you were never coming back. What was the big idea, +springing over to England like that?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +had been expecting the question, and answered it with composure.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +wanted to help Mr. Faucitt.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Who’s +Mr. Faucitt?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Hasn’t +Fillmore ever mentioned him? He was a dear old man at the +boarding-house, and his brother died and left him a dressmaking +establishment in London. He screamed to me to come and tell him what +to do about it. He has sold it now and is quite happy in the +country.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +the trip’s done you good,” said Mrs. Fillmore. “You’re +prettier than ever.”</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was a pause. Already, in these trivial opening exchanges, Sally had +sensed a suggestion of unwonted gravity in her companion. She missed +that careless whimsicality which had been the chief characteristic of +Miss Gladys Winch and seemed to have been cast off by Mrs. Fillmore +Nicholas. At their meeting, before she had spoken, Sally had not +noticed this, but now it was apparent that something was weighing on +her companion. Mrs. Fillmore’s honest eyes were troubled.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What’s +the bad news?” asked Sally abruptly. She wanted to end the +suspense. “Fillmore was telling me over the ‘phone that +you had some bad news for me.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mrs. +Fillmore scratched at the carpet for a moment with the end of her +parasol without replying. When she spoke it was not in answer to the +question.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Sally, +who’s this man Carmyle over in England?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +did Fillmore tell you about him?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“He +told me there was a rich fellow over in England who was crazy about +you and had asked you to marry him, and that you had turned him +down.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally’s +momentary annoyance faded. She could hardly, she felt, have expected +Fillmore to refrain from mentioning the matter to his wife.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes,” +she said. “That’s true.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +couldn’t write and say you’ve changed your mind?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally’s +annoyance returned. All her life she had been intensely independent, +resentful of interference with her private concerns.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +suppose I could if I had—but I haven’t. Did Fillmore +tell you to try to talk me round?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +I’m not trying to talk you round,” said Mrs. Fillmore +quickly. “Goodness knows, I’m the last person to try and +jolly anyone into marrying anybody if they didn’t feel like it. + I’ve seen too many marriages go wrong to do that. Look at +Elsa Doland.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally’s +heart jumped as if an exposed nerve had been touched.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Elsa?” +she stammered, and hated herself because her voice shook. “Has—has +her marriage gone wrong?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Gone +all to bits,” said Mrs. Fillmore shortly. “You remember +she married Gerald Foster, the man who wrote ‘The Primrose +Way’?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +with an effort repressed an hysterical laugh.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +I remember,” she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +it’s all gone bloo-ey. I’ll tell you about that in a +minute. Coming back to this man in England, if you’re in any +doubt about it... I mean, you can’t always tell right away +whether you’re fond of a man or not... When first I met +Fillmore, I couldn’t see him with a spy-glass, and now he’s +just the whole shooting-match... But that’s not what I wanted +to talk about. I was saying one doesn’t always know one’s +own mind at first, and if this fellow really is a good fellow... and +Fillmore tells me he’s got all the money in the world...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +stopped her.</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +it’s no good. I don’t want to marry Mr. Carmyle.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“That’s +that, then,” said Mrs. Fillmore. “It’s a pity, +though.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why +are you taking it so much to heart?” said Sally with a nervous +laugh.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well...” +Mrs. Fillmore paused. Sally’s anxiety was growing. It must, +she realized, be something very serious indeed that had happened if +it had the power to make her forthright sister-in-law disjointed in +her talk. “You see...” went on Mrs. Fillmore, and +stopped again. “Gee! I’m hating this!” she +murmured.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +is it? I don’t understand.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’ll +find it’s all too darned clear by the time I’m through,” +said Mrs. Fillmore mournfully. “If I’m going to explain +this thing, I guess I’d best start at the beginning. You +remember that revue of Fillmore’s—the one we both begged +him not to put on. It flopped!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes. + It flopped on the road and died there. Never got to New York at +all. Ike Schumann wouldn’t let Fillmore have a theatre. The +book wanted fixing and the numbers wanted fixing and the scenery +wasn’t right: and while they were tinkering with all that there +was trouble about the cast and the Actors Equity closed the show. +Best thing that could have happened, really, and I was glad at the +time, because going on with it would only have meant wasting more +money, and it had cost a fortune already. After that Fillmore put on +a play of Gerald Foster’s and that was a frost, too. It ran a +week at the Booth. I hear the new piece he’s got in rehearsal +now is no good either. It’s called ‘The Wild Rose,’ +or something. But Fillmore’s got nothing to do with that.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But...” +Sally tried to speak, but Mrs. Fillmore went on.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Don’t +talk just yet, or I shall never get this thing straight. Well, you +know Fillmore, poor darling. Anyone else would have pulled in his +horns and gone slow for a spell, but he’s one of those fellows +whose horse is always going to win the next race. The big killing is +always just round the corner with him. Funny how you can see what a +chump a man is and yet love him to death... I remember saying +something like that to you before... He thought he could get it all +back by staging this fight of his that came off in Jersey City last +night. And if everything had gone right he might have got afloat +again. But it seems as if he can’t touch anything without it +turning to mud. On the very day before the fight was to come off, +the poor mutt who was going against the champion goes and lets a +sparring-partner of his own knock him down and fool around with him. +With all the newspaper men there too! You probably saw about it in +the papers. It made a great story for them. Well, that killed the +whole thing. The public had never been any too sure that this fellow +Bugs Butler had a chance of putting up a scrap with the champion that +would be worth paying to see; and, when they read that he couldn’t +even stop his sparring-partners slamming him all around the place +they simply decided to stay away. Poor old Fill! It was a finisher +for him. The house wasn’t a quarter full, and after he’d +paid these two pluguglies their guarantees, which they insisted on +having before they’d so much as go into the ring, he was just +about cleaned out. So there you are!”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +had listened with dismay to this catalogue of misfortunes.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +poor Fill!” she cried. “How dreadful!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Pretty +tough.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +‘The Primrose Way’ is a big success, isn’t it?” +said Sally, anxious to discover something of brightness in the +situation.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +was.” Mrs. Fillmore flushed again. “This is the part I +hate having to tell you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It +was? Do you mean it isn’t still? I thought Elsa had made such a +tremendous hit. I read about it when I was over in London. It was +even in one of the English papers.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +she made a hit all right,” said Mrs. Fillmore drily. “She +made such a hit that all the other managements in New York were after +her right away, and Fillmore had hardly sailed when she handed in her +notice and signed up with Goble and Cohn for a new piece they are +starring her in.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ah, +she couldn’t!” cried Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">“My +dear, she did! She’s out on the road with it now. I had to +break the news to poor old Fillmore at the dock when he landed. It +was rather a blow. I must say it wasn’t what I would call +playing the game. I know there isn’t supposed to be any +sentiment in business, but after all we had given Elsa her big +chance. But Fillmore wouldn’t put her name up over the theatre +in electrics, and Goble and Cohn made it a clause in her contract +that they would, so nothing else mattered. People are like that.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +Elsa... She used not to be like that.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“They +all get that way. They must grab success if it’s to be +grabbed. I suppose you can’t blame them. You might just as +well expect a cat to keep off catnip. Still, she might have waited +to the end of the New York run.” Mrs. Fillmore put out her hand +and touched Sally’s. “Well, I’ve got it out now,” +she said, “and, believe me, it was one rotten job. You don’t +know how sorry I am. Sally. I wouldn’t have had it happen for +a million dollars. Nor would Fillmore. I’m not sure that I +blame him for getting cold feet and backing out of telling you +himself. He just hadn’t the nerve to come and confess that he +had fooled away your money. He was hoping all along that this fight +would pan out big and that he’d be able to pay you back what +you had loaned him, but things didn’t happen right.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +was silent. She was thinking how strange it was that this room in +which she had hoped to be so happy had been from the first moment of +her occupancy a storm centre of bad news and miserable +disillusionment. In this first shock of the tidings, it was the +disillusionment that hurt most. She had always been so fond of Elsa, +and Elsa had always seemed so fond of her. She remembered that +letter of Elsa’s with all its protestations of gratitude... It +wasn’t straight. It was horrible. Callous, selfish, +altogether horrible... +</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s...” +She choked, as a rush of indignation brought the tears to her eyes. +“It’s... beastly! I’m... I’m not thinking +about my money. That’s just bad luck. But Elsa...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mrs. +Fillmore shrugged her square shoulders.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +it’s happening all the time in the show business,” she +said. “And in every other business, too, I guess, if one only +knew enough about them to be able to say. Of course, it hits you +hard because Elsa was a pal of yours, and you’re thinking she +might have considered you after all you’ve done for her. I +can’t say I’m much surprised myself.” Mrs. Fillmore +was talking rapidly, and dimly Sally understood that she was talking +so that talk would carry her over this bad moment. Silence now would +have been unendurable. “I was in the company with her, and it +sometimes seems to me as if you can’t get to know a person +right through till you’ve been in the same company with them. +Elsa’s all right, but she’s two people really, like these +dual identity cases you read about. She’s awfully fond of you. + I know she is. She was always saying so, and it was quite genuine. +If it didn’t interfere with business there’s nothing she +wouldn’t do for you. But when it’s a case of her career +you don’t count. Nobody counts. Not even her husband. Now +that’s funny. If you think that sort of thing funny. +Personally, it gives me the willies.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What’s +funny?” asked Sally, dully.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +you weren’t there, so you didn’t see it, but I was on the +spot all the time, and I know as well as I know anything that he +simply married her because he thought she could get him on in the +game. He hardly paid any attention to her at all till she was such a +riot in Chicago, and then he was all over her. And now he’s +got stung. She throws down his show and goes off to another +fellow’s. It’s like marrying for money and finding the +girl hasn’t any. And she’s got stung, too, in a way, +because I’m pretty sure she married him mostly because she +thought he was going to be the next big man in the play-writing +business and could boost her up the ladder. And now it doesn’t +look as though he had another success in him. The result is they’re +at outs. I hear he’s drinking. Somebody who’d seen him +told me he had gone all to pieces. You haven’t seen him, I +suppose?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +thought maybe you might have run into him. He lives right opposite.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +clutched at the arm of her chair.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Lives +right opposite? Gerald Foster? What do you mean?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Across +the passage there,” said Mrs. Fillmore, jerking her thumb at +the door. “Didn’t you know? That’s right, I +suppose you didn’t. They moved in after you had beaten it for +England. Elsa wanted to be near you, and she was tickled to death +when she found there was an apartment to be had right across from +you. Now, that just proves what I was saying a while ago about Elsa. + If she wasn’t fond of you, would she go out of her way to camp +next door? And yet, though she’s so fond of you, she doesn’t +hesitate about wrecking your property by quitting the show when she +sees a chance of doing herself a bit of good. It’s funny, +isn’t it?”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +telephone-bell, tinkling sharply, rescued Sally from the necessity of +a reply. She forced herself across the room to answer it. +</p> + +<p class="normal">“Hullo?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger’s +voice spoke jubilantly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Hullo. + Are you there? I say, it’s all right, about that binge, you +know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +yes?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“That +dog fellow, you know,” said Ginger, with a slight diminution of +exuberance. His sensitive ear had seemed to detect a lack of +animation in her voice. “I’ve just been talking to him +over the ‘phone, and it’s all settled. If,” he +added, with a touch of doubt, “you still feel like going into +it, I mean.”</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was an instant in which Sally hesitated, but it was only an instant.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why, +of course,” she said, steadily. “Why should you think I +had changed my mind?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +I thought... that is to say, you seemed... oh, I don’t know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +imagine things. I was a little worried about something when you +called me up, and my mind wasn’t working properly. Of course, +go ahead with it. Ginger. I’m delighted.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +say, I’m awfully sorry you’re worried.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh. + it’s all right.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Something +bad?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Nothing +that’ll kill me. I’m young and strong.” +</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +was silent for a moment.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +say, I don’t want to butt in, but can I do anything?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +really, Ginger, I know you would do anything you could, but this is +just something I must worry through by myself. When do you go down +to this place?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +was thinking of popping down this afternoon, just to take a look +round.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Let +me know what train you’re making and I’ll come and see +you off.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“That’s +ripping of you. Right ho. Well, so long.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“So +long,” said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mrs. +Fillmore, who had been sitting in that state of suspended animation +which comes upon people who are present at a telephone conversation +which has nothing to do with themselves, came to life as Sally +replaced the receiver.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Sally,” +she said, “I think we ought to have a talk now about what +you’re going to do.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +was not feeling equal to any discussion of the future. All she +asked of the world at the moment was to be left alone.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +that’s all right. I shall manage. You ought to be worrying +about Fillmore.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Fillmore’s +got me to look after him,” said Gladys, with quiet +determination. “You’re the one that’s on my mind. +I lay awake all last night thinking about you. As far as I can make +out from Fillmore, you’ve still a few thousand dollars left. +Well, as it happens, I can put you on to a really good thing. I know +a girl...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +afraid,” interrupted Sally, “all the rest of my money, +what there is of it, is tied up.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +can’t get hold of it?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +listen,” said Mrs. Fillmore, urgently. “This is a really +good thing. This girl I know started an interior decorating business +some time ago and is pulling in the money in handfuls. But she wants +more capital, and she’s willing to let go of a third of the +business to anyone who’ll put in a few thousand. She won’t +have any difficulty getting it, but I ‘phoned her this morning +to hold off till I’d heard from you. Honestly, Sally, it’s +the chance of a lifetime. It would put you right on easy street. +Isn’t there really any way you could get your money out of this +other thing and take on this deal?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“There +really isn’t. I’m awfully obliged to you, Gladys dear, +but it’s impossible.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well,” +said Mrs. Fillmore, prodding the carpet energetically with her +parasol, “I don’t know what you’ve gone into, but, +unless they’ve given you a share in the Mint or something, +you’ll be losing by not making the switch. You’re sure +you can’t do it?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +really can’t.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mrs. +Fillmore rose, plainly disappointed.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +you know best, of course. Gosh! What a muddle everything is. +Sally,” she said, suddenly stopping at the door, “you’re +not going to hate poor old Fillmore over this, are you?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why, +of course not. The whole thing was just bad luck.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“He’s +worried stiff about it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +give him my love, and tell him not to be so silly.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mrs. +Fillmore crossed the room and kissed Sally impulsively.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’re +an angel,” she said. “I wish there were more like you. +But I guess they’ve lost the pattern. Well, I’ll go back +and tell Fillmore that. It’ll relieve him.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +door closed, and Sally sat down with her chin in her hands to think.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">3</h3> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Isadore Abrahams, the founder and proprietor of that deservedly +popular dancing resort poetically named “The Flower Garden,” +leaned back in his chair with a contented sigh and laid down the +knife and fork with which he had been assailing a plateful of +succulent goulash. He was dining, as was his admirable custom, in +the bosom of his family at his residence at Far Rockaway. Across the +table, his wife, Rebecca, beamed at him over her comfortable plinth +of chins, and round the table his children, David, Jacob, Morris and +Saide, would have beamed at him if they had not been too busy at the +moment ingurgitating goulash. A genial, honest, domestic man was Mr. +Abrahams, a credit to the community.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Mother,” +he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Pa?” +said Mrs. Abrahams.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Knew +there was something I’d meant to tell you,” said Mr. +Abrahams, absently chasing a piece of bread round his plate with a +stout finger. “You remember that girl I told you about some +time back—girl working at the Garden—girl called +Nicholas, who came into a bit of money and threw up her job...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +remember. You liked her. Jakie, dear, don’t gobble.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ain’t +gobbling,” said Master Abrahams.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Everybody +liked her,” said Mr. Abrahams. “The nicest girl I ever +hired, and I don’t hire none but nice girls, because the +Garden’s a nice place, and I like to run it nice. I wouldn’t +give you a nickel for any of your tough joints where you get nothing +but low-lifes and scare away all the real folks. Everybody liked +Sally Nicholas. Always pleasant and always smiling, and never +anything but the lady. It was a treat to have her around. Well, +what do you think?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Dead?” +inquired Mrs. Abrahams, apprehensively. The story had sounded to her +as though it were heading that way. “Wipe your mouth, Jakie +dear.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +not dead,” said Mr. Abrahams, conscious for the first time that +the remainder of his narrative might be considered by a critic +something of an anti-climax and lacking in drama. “But she was +in to see me this afternoon and wants her job back.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ah!” +said Mrs. Abrahams, rather tonelessly. An ardent supporter of the +local motion-picture palace, she had hoped for a slightly more +gingery <i>denouement,</i> something with a bit more punch.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +but don’t it show you?” continued Mr. Abrahams, gallantly +trying to work up the interest. “There’s this girl, goes +out of my place not more’n a year ago, with a good bank-roll in +her pocket, and here she is, back again, all of it spent. Don’t +it show you what a tragedy life is, if you see what I mean, and how +careful one ought to be about money? It’s what I call a human +document. Goodness knows how she’s been and gone and spent it +all. I’d never have thought she was the sort of girl to go +gadding around. Always seemed to me to be kind of sensible.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What’s +gadding, Pop?” asked Master Jakie, the goulash having ceased to +chain his interest.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +she wanted her job back and I gave it to her, and glad to get her +back again. There’s class to that girl. She’s the sort +of girl I want in the place. Don’t seem quite to have so much +get-up in her as she used to... seems kind of quieted down... but +she’s got class, and I’m glad she’s back. I hope +she’ll stay. But don’t it show you?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ah!” +said Mrs. Abrahams, with more enthusiasm than before. It had not +worked out such a bad story after all. In its essentials it was not +unlike the film she had seen the previous evening—Gloria Gooch +in “A Girl against the World.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Pop!” +said Master Abrahams.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +Jakie?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“When +I’m grown up, I won’t never lose no money. I’ll +put it in the bank and save it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +slight depression caused by the contemplation of Sally’s +troubles left Mr. Abrahams as mist melts beneath a sunbeam.</p> + +<p class="normal">“That’s +a good boy, Jakie,” he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">He +felt in his waistcoat pocket, found a dime, put it back again, and +bent forward and patted Master Abrahams on the head.</p> + + +<h3 class="chap">CHAPTER XV</h3> + +<h3 class="titl">UNCLE DONALD SPEAKS HIS MIND</h3> + +<p class="normal">There +is in certain men—and Bruce Carmyle was one of them—a +quality of resilience, a sturdy refusal to acknowledge defeat, which +aids them as effectively in affairs of the heart as in encounters of +a sterner and more practical kind. As a wooer, Bruce Carmyle +resembled that durable type of pugilist who can only give of his best +after he has received at least one substantial wallop on some tender +spot. Although Sally had refused his offer of marriage quite +definitely at Monk’s Crofton, it had never occurred to him to +consider the episode closed. All his life he had been accustomed to +getting what he wanted, and he meant to get it now.</p> + +<p class="normal">He +was quite sure that he wanted Sally. There had been moments when he +had been conscious of certain doubts, but in the smart of temporary +defeat these had vanished. That streak of Bohemianism in her which +from time to time since their first meeting had jarred upon his +orderly mind was forgotten; and all that Mr. Carmyle could remember +was the brightness of her eyes, the jaunty lift of her chin, and the +gallant trimness of her. Her gay prettiness seemed to flick at him +like a whip in the darkness of wakeful nights, lashing him to +pursuit. And quietly and methodically, like a respectable wolf +settling on the trail of a Red Riding Hood, he prepared to pursue. +Delicacy and imagination might have kept him back, but in these +qualities he had never been strong. One cannot have everything.</p> + +<p class="normal">His +preparations for departure, though he did his best to make them +swiftly and secretly, did not escape the notice of the Family. In +many English families there seems to exist a system of +inter-communication and news-distribution like that of those savage +tribes in Africa who pass the latest item of news and interest from +point to point over miles of intervening jungle by some telepathic +method never properly explained. On his last night in London, there +entered to Bruce Carmyle at his apartment in South Audley Street, the +Family’s chosen representative, the man to whom the Family +pointed with pride—Uncle Donald, in the flesh.</p> + +<p class="normal">There +were two hundred and forty pounds of the flesh Uncle Donald was in, +and the chair in which he deposited it creaked beneath its burden. +Once, at Monk’s Crofton, Sally had spoiled a whole morning for +her brother Fillmore, by indicating Uncle Donald as the exact image +of what he would be when he grew up. A superstition, cherished from +early schooldays, that he had a weak heart had caused the Family’s +managing director to abstain from every form of exercise for nearly +fifty years; and, as he combined with a distaste for exercise one of +the three heartiest appetites in the south-western postal division of +London, Uncle Donald, at sixty-two, was not a man one would willingly +have lounging in one’s armchairs. Bruce Carmyle’s +customary respectfulness was tinged with something approaching +dislike as he looked at him.</p> + +<p class="normal">Uncle +Donald’s walrus moustache heaved gently upon his laboured +breath, like seaweed on a ground-swell. There had been stairs to +climb.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What’s +this? What’s this?” he contrived to ejaculate at last. +“You packing?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes,” +said Mr. Carmyle, shortly. For the first time in his life he was +conscious of that sensation of furtive guilt which was habitual with +his cousin Ginger when in the presence of this large, mackerel-eyed +man. +</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +going away?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Where +you going?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“America.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“When +you going?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“To-morrow +morning.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why +you going?”</p> + +<p class="normal">This +dialogue has been set down as though it had been as brisk and snappy +as any cross-talk between vaudeville comedians, but in reality Uncle +Donald’s peculiar methods of conversation had stretched it over +a period of nearly three minutes: for after each reply and before +each question he had puffed and sighed and inhaled his moustache with +such painful deliberation that his companion’s nerves were +finding it difficult to bear up under the strain.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’re +going after that girl,” said Uncle Donald, accusingly.</p> + +<p class="normal">Bruce +Carmyle flushed darkly. And it is interesting to record that at this +moment there flitted through his mind the thought that Ginger’s +behaviour at Bleke’s Coffee House, on a certain notable +occasion, had not been so utterly inexcusable as he had supposed. +There was no doubt that the Family’s Chosen One could be +trying.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Will +you have a whisky and soda, Uncle Donald?” he said, by way of +changing the conversation.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes,” +said his relative, in pursuance of a vow he had made in the early +eighties never to refuse an offer of this kind. “Gimme!”</p> + +<p class="normal">You +would have thought that that would have put matters on a pleasanter +footing. But no. Having lapped up the restorative, Uncle Donald +returned to the attack quite un-softened.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Never +thought you were a fool before,” he said severely.</p> + +<p class="normal">Bruce +Carmyle’s proud spirit chafed. This sort of interview, which +had become a commonplace with his cousin Ginger, was new to him. +Hitherto, his actions had received neither criticism nor been +subjected to it.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +not a fool.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +<i>are</i> a fool. A damn fool,” continued Uncle Donald, +specifying more exactly. “Don’t like the girl. Never +did. Not a nice girl. Didn’t like her. Right from the +first.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Need +we discuss this?” said Bruce Carmyle, dropping, as he was apt +to do, into the grand manner.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +Head of the Family drank in a layer of moustache and blew it out +again.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Need +we discuss it?” he said with asperity. “We’re +<i>going to</i> discuss it! Whatch think I climbed all these blasted +stairs for with my weak heart? Gimme another!”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Carmyle gave him another.</p> + +<p class="normal">“‘S +a bad business,” moaned Uncle Donald, having gone through the +movements once more. “Shocking bad business. If your poor +father were alive, whatch think he’d say to your tearing across +the world after this girl? I’ll tell you what he’d say. +He’d say... What kind of whisky’s this?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“O’Rafferty +Special.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“New +to me. Not bad. Quite good. Sound. Mellow. Wherej get it?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Bilby’s +in Oxford Street.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Must +order some. Mellow. He’d say... well, God knows <i>what</i> +he’d say. Whatch doing it for? Whatch doing it for? That’s +what I can’t see. None of us can see. Puzzles your uncle +George. Baffles your aunt Geraldine. Nobody can understand it. +Girl’s simply after your money. Anyone can see that.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Pardon +me, Uncle Donald,” said Mr. Carmyle, stiffly, “but that +is surely rather absurd. If that were the case, why should she have +refused me at Monk’s Crofton?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Drawing +you on,” said Uncle Donald, promptly. “Luring you on. +Well-known trick. Girl in 1881, when I was at Oxford, tried to lure +<i>me</i> on. If I hadn’t had some sense and a weak heart... +Whatch know of this girl? Whatch <i>know</i> of her? That’s the +point. Who <i>is</i> she? Wherej meet her?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +met her at Roville, in France.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Travelling +with her family?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Travelling +alone,” said Bruce Carmyle, reluctantly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Not +even with that brother of hers? Bad!” said Uncle Donald. “Bad, +bad!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“American +girls are accustomed to more independence than English girls.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“That +young man,” said Uncle Donald, pursuing a train of thought, “is +going to be <i>fat</i> one of these days, if he doesn’t look +out. Travelling alone, was she? What did you do? Catch her eye on +the pier?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Really, +Uncle Donald!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +must have got to know her somehow.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +was introduced to her by Lancelot. She was a friend of his.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Lancelot!” +exploded Uncle Donald, quivering all over like a smitten jelly at the +loathed name. “Well, that shows you what sort of a girl she +is. Any girl that would be a friend of... Unpack!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +beg your pardon?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Unpack! +Mustn’t go on with this foolery. Out of the question. Find +some girl make you a good wife. Your aunt Mary’s been meeting +some people name of Bassington-Bassington, related Kent +Bassington-Bassingtons... eldest daughter charming girl, just do for +you.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Outside +the pages of the more old-fashioned type of fiction nobody ever +really ground his teeth, but Bruce Carmyle came nearer to it at that +moment than anyone had ever come before. He scowled blackly, and the +last trace of suavity left him.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +shall do nothing of the kind,” he said briefly. “I sail +to-morrow.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Uncle +Donald had had a previous experience of being defied by a nephew, but +it had not accustomed him to the sensation. He was aware of an +unpleasant feeling of impotence. Nothing is harder than to know what +to do next when defied.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Eh?” +he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Carmyle having started to defy, evidently decided to make a good job +of it.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +am over twenty-one,” said he. “I am financially +independent. I shall do as I please.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But, +consider!” pleaded Uncle Donald, painfully conscious of the +weakness of his words. “Reflect!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +have reflected.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Your +position in the county...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ve +thought of that.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +could marry anyone you pleased.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +going to.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +are determined to go running off to God-knows-where after this Miss +I-can’t-even-remember-her-dam-name?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Have +you considered,” said Uncle Donald, portentously, “that +you owe a duty to the Family.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Bruce +Carmyle’s patience snapped and he sank like a stone to +absolutely Gingerian depths of plain-spokenness.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +damn the Family!” he cried.</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was a painful silence, broken only by the relieved sigh of the +armchair as Uncle Donald heaved himself out of it.</p> + +<p class="normal">“After +that,” said Uncle Donald, “I have nothing more to say.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Good!” +said Mr. Carmyle rudely, lost to all shame.</p> + +<p class="normal">“’Cept +this. If you come back married to that girl, I’ll cut you in +Piccadilly. By George, I will!”</p> + +<p class="normal">He +moved to the door. Bruce Carmyle looked down his nose without +speaking. A tense moment.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What,” +asked Uncle Donald, his fingers on the handle, “did you say it +was called?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +was what called?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“That +whisky.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“O’Rafferty +Special.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +wherj get it?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Bilby’s, +in Oxford Street.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ll +make a note of it,” said Uncle Donald.</p> + + +<h3 class="chap">CHAPTER XVI</h3> + +<h3 class="titl">AT THE FLOWER GARDEN</h3> + +<h3 class="sect">1</h3> + +<p class="normal">“And +after all I’ve done for her,” said Mr. Reginald +Cracknell, his voice tremulous with self-pity and his eyes moist with +the combined effects of anguish and over-indulgence in his celebrated +private stock, “after all I’ve done for her she throws me +down.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +did not reply. The orchestra of the Flower Garden was of a calibre +that discouraged vocal competition; and she was having, moreover, too +much difficulty in adjusting her feet to Mr. Cracknell’s +erratic dance-steps to employ her attention elsewhere. They +manoeuvred jerkily past the table where Miss Mabel Hobson, the Flower +Garden’s newest “hostess,” sat watching the revels +with a distant hauteur. Miss Hobson was looking her most regal in +old gold and black, and a sorrowful gulp escaped the stricken Mr. +Cracknell as he shambled beneath her eye.</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +I told you,” he moaned in Sally’s ear, “what... was +that your ankle? Sorry! Don’t know what I’m doing +to-night... If I told you what I had spent on that woman, you +wouldn’t believe it. And then she throws me down. And all +because I said I didn’t like her in that hat. She hasn’t +spoken to me for a week, and won’t answer when I call up on the +‘phone. And I was right, too. It was a rotten hat. Didn’t +suit her a bit. But that,” said Mr. Cracknell, morosely, “is +a woman all over!”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +uttered a stifled exclamation as his wandering foot descended on hers +before she could get it out of the way. Mr. Cracknell interpreted +the ejaculation as a protest against the sweeping harshness of his +last remark, and gallantly tried to make amends.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t mean you’re like that,” he said. “You’re +different. I could see that directly I saw you. You have a +sympathetic nature. That’s why I’m telling you all this. + You’re a sensible and broad-minded girl and can understand. +I’ve done everything for that woman. I got her this job as +hostess here—you wouldn’t believe what they pay her. I +starred her in a show once. Did you see those pearls she was +wearing? I gave her those. And she won’t speak to me. Just +because I didn’t like her hat. I wish you could have seen that +hat. You would agree with me, I know, because you’re a +sensible, broad-minded girl and understand hats. I don’t know +what to do. I come here every night.” Sally was aware of this. + She had seen him often, but this was the first time that Lee +Schoenstein, the gentlemanly master of ceremonies, had inflicted him +on her. “I come here every night and dance past her table, but +she won’t look at me. What,” asked Mr. Cracknell, tears +welling in his pale eyes, “would you do about it?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t know,” said Sally, frankly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Nor +do I. I thought you wouldn’t, because you’re a sensible, +broad-minded... I mean, nor do I. I’m having one last try +to-night, if you can keep a secret. You won’t tell anyone, +will you?” pleaded Mr. Cracknell, urgently. “But I know +you won’t because you’re a sensible... I’m giving +her a little present. Having it brought here to-night. Little +present. That ought to soften her, don’t you think?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“A +big one would do it better.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Cracknell kicked her on the shin in a dismayed sort of way.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +never thought of that. Perhaps you’re right. But it’s +too late now. Still, it might. Or wouldn’t it? Which do you +think?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes,” +said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +thought as much,” said Mr. Cracknell.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +orchestra stopped with a thump and a bang, leaving Mr. Cracknell +clapping feebly in the middle of the floor. Sally slipped back to +her table. Her late partner, after an uncertain glance about him, as +if he had mislaid something but could not remember what, zigzagged +off in search of his own seat. The noise of many conversations, +drowned by the music, broke out with renewed vigour. The hot, close +air was full of voices; and Sally, pressing her hands on her closed +eyes, was reminded once more that she had a headache.</p> + +<p class="normal">Nearly +a month had passed since her return to Mr. Abrahams’ +employment. It had been a dull, leaden month, a monotonous +succession of lifeless days during which life had become a bad dream. + In some strange nightmare fashion, she seemed nowadays to be cut off +from her kind. It was weeks since she had seen a familiar face. +None of the companions of her old boarding-house days had crossed her +path. Fillmore, no doubt from uneasiness of conscience, had not +sought her out, and Ginger was working out his destiny on the south +shore of Long Island.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +lowered her hands and opened her eyes and looked at the room. It was +crowded, as always. The Flower Garden was one of the many +establishments of the same kind which had swum to popularity on the +rising flood of New York’s dancing craze; and doubtless +because, as its proprietor had claimed, it was a nice place and run +nice, it had continued, unlike many of its rivals, to enjoy unvarying +prosperity. In its advertisement, it described itself as “a +supper-club for after-theatre dining and dancing,” adding that +“large and spacious, and sumptuously appointed,” it was +“one of the town’s wonder-places, with its incomparable +dance-floor, enchanting music, cuisine, and service de luxe.” +From which it may be gathered, even without his personal statements +to that effect, that Isadore Abrahams thought well of the place.</p> + +<p class="normal">There +had been a time when Sally had liked it, too. In her first period of +employment there she had found it diverting, stimulating and full of +entertainment. But in those days she had never had headaches or, +what was worse, this dreadful listless depression which weighed her +down and made her nightly work a burden.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Miss +Nicholas.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +orchestra, never silent for long at the Flower Garden, had started +again, and Lee Schoenstein, the master of ceremonies, was presenting +a new partner. She got up mechanically.</p> + +<p class="normal">“This +is the first time I have been in this place,” said the man, as +they bumped over the crowded floor. He was big and clumsy, of +course. To-night it seemed to Sally that the whole world was big and +clumsy. “It’s a swell place. I come from up-state +myself. We got nothing like this where I come from.” He +cleared a space before him, using Sally as a battering-ram, and +Sally, though she had not enjoyed her recent excursion with Mr. +Cracknell, now began to look back to it almost with wistfulness. +This man was undoubtedly the worst dancer in America.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Give +me li’l old New York,” said the man from up-state, +unpatriotically. “It’s good enough for me. I been to +some swell shows since I got to town. You seen this year’s +‘Follies’?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +go,” said the man earnestly. “You <i>go!</i> Take it +from me, it’s a swell show. You seen ‘Myrtle takes a +Turkish Bath’?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t go to many theatres.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +go! It’s a scream. I been to a show every night since I got +here. Every night regular. Swell shows all of ‘em, except +this last one. I cert’nly picked a lemon to-night all right. +I was taking a chance, y’see, because it was an opening. +Thought it would be something to say, when I got home, that I’d +been to a New York opening. Set me back two-seventy-five, including +tax, and I wish I’d got it in my kick right now. ‘The +Wild Rose,’ they called it,” he said satirically, as if +exposing a low subterfuge on the part of the management. “’The +Wild Rose!’ It sure made me wild all right. Two dollars +seventy-five tossed away, just like that.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Something +stirred in Sally’s memory. Why did that title seem so +familiar? Then, with a shock, she remembered. It was Gerald’s +new play. For some time after her return to New York, she had been +haunted by the fear lest, coming out other apartment, she might meet +him coming out of his; and then she had seen a paragraph in her +morning paper which had relieved her of this apprehension. Gerald +was out on the road with a new play, and “The Wild Rose,” +she was almost sure, was the name of it.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Is +that Gerald Foster’s play?” she asked quickly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t know who wrote it,” said her partner, “but +let me tell you he’s one lucky guy to get away alive. There’s +fellows breaking stones on the Ossining Road that’s done a lot +less to deserve a sentence. Wild Rose! I’ll tell the world it +made me go good and wild,” said the man from up-state, an +economical soul who disliked waste and was accustomed to spread out +his humorous efforts so as to give them every chance. “Why, +before the second act was over, the people were beating it for the +exits, and if it hadn’t been for someone shouting ‘Women +and children first’ there’d have been a panic.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +found herself back at her table without knowing clearly how she had +got there.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Miss +Nicholas.”</p> + +<p class="normal">She +started to rise, and was aware suddenly that this was not the voice +of duty calling her once more through the gold teeth of Mr. +Schoenstein. The man who had spoken her name had seated himself +beside her, and was talking in precise, clipped accents, oddly +familiar. The mist cleared from her eyes and she recognized Bruce +Carmyle.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">2</h3> + +<p class="normal">“I +called at your place,” Mr. Carmyle was saying, “and the +hall porter told me that you were here, so I ventured to follow you. +I hope you do not mind? May I smoke?”</p> + +<p class="normal">He +lit a cigarette with something of an air. His fingers trembled as he +raised the match, but he flattered himself that there was nothing +else in his demeanour to indicate that he was violently excited. +Bruce Carmyle’s ideal was the strong man who can rise superior +to his emotions. He was alive to the fact that this was an +embarrassing moment, but he was determined not to show that he +appreciated it. He cast a sideways glance at Sally, and thought that +never, not even in the garden at Monk’s Crofton on a certain +momentous occasion, had he seen her looking prettier. Her face was +flushed and her eyes aflame. The stout wraith of Uncle Donald, which +had accompanied Mr. Carmyle on this expedition of his, faded into +nothingness as he gazed.</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was a pause. Mr. Carmyle, having lighted his cigarette, puffed +vigorously.</p> + +<p class="normal">“When +did you land?” asked Sally, feeling the need of saying +something. Her mind was confused. She could not have said whether +she was glad or sorry that he was there. Glad, she thought, on the +whole. There was something in his dark, cool, stiff English aspect +that gave her a curious feeling of relief. He was so unlike Mr. +Cracknell and the man from up-state and so calmly remote from the +feverish atmosphere in which she lived her nights that it was restful +to look at him.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +landed to-night,” said Bruce Carmyle, turning and faced her +squarely.</p> + +<p class="normal">“To-night!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“We +docked at ten.”</p> + +<p class="normal">He +turned away again. He had made his effect, and was content to leave +her to think it over.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +was silent. The significance of his words had not escaped her. She +realized that his presence there was a challenge which she must +answer. And yet it hardly stirred her. She had been fighting so +long, and she felt utterly inert. She was like a swimmer who can +battle no longer and prepares to yield to the numbness of exhaustion. + The heat of the room pressed down on her like a smothering blanket. +Her tired nerves cried out under the blare of music and the clatter +of voices.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Shall +we dance this?” he asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +orchestra had started to play again, a sensuous, creamy melody which +was making the most of its brief reign as Broadway’s leading +song-hit, overfamiliar to her from a hundred repetitions.</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +you like.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Efficiency +was Bruce Carmyle’s gospel. He was one of these men who do not +attempt anything which they cannot accomplish to perfection. +Dancing, he had decided early in his life, was a part of a +gentleman’s education, and he had seen to it that he was +educated thoroughly. Sally, who, as they swept out on to the floor, +had braced herself automatically for a repetition of the usual +bumping struggle which dancing at the Flower Garden had come to mean +for her, found herself in the arms of a masterful expert, a man who +danced better than she did, and suddenly there came to her a feeling +that was almost gratitude, a miraculous slackening of her taut +nerves, a delicious peace. Soothed and contented, she yielded +herself with eyes half closed to the rhythm of the melody, finding it +now robbed in some mysterious manner of all its stale cheapness, and +in that moment her whole attitude towards Bruce Carmyle underwent a +complete change.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +had never troubled to examine with any minuteness her feelings +towards him: but one thing she had known clearly since their first +meeting—that he was physically distasteful to her. For all his +good looks, and in his rather sinister way he was a handsome man, she +had shrunk from him. Now, spirited away by the magic of the dance, +that repugnance had left her. It was as if some barrier had been +broken down between them.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Sally!”</p> + +<p class="normal">She +felt his arm tighten about her, the muscles quivering. She caught +sight of his face. His dark eyes suddenly blazed into hers and she +stumbled with an odd feeling of helplessness; realizing with a shock +that brought her with a jerk out of the half-dream into which she had +been lulled that this dance had not postponed the moment of decision, +as she had looked to it to do. In a hot whisper, the words swept +away on the flood of the music which had suddenly become raucous and +blaring once more, he was repeating what he had said under the trees +at Monk’s Crofton on that far-off morning in the English +springtime. Dizzily she knew that she was resenting the unfairness +of the attack at such a moment, but her mind seemed numbed.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +music stopped abruptly. Insistent clapping started it again, but +Sally moved away to her table, and he followed her like a shadow. +Neither spoke. Bruce Carmyle had said his say, and Sally was sitting +staring before her, trying to think. She was tired, tired. Her eyes +were burning. She tried to force herself to face the situation +squarely. Was it worth struggling? Was anything in the world worth a +struggle? She only knew that she was tired, desperately tired, tired +to the very depths of her soul.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +music stopped. There was more clapping, but this time the orchestra +did not respond. Gradually the floor emptied. The shuffling of feet +ceased. The Flower Garden was as quiet as it was ever able to be. +Even the voices of the babblers seemed strangely hushed. Sally +closed her eyes, and as she did so from somewhere up near the roof +there came the song of a bird.</p> + +<p class="normal">Isadore +Abrahams was a man of his word. He advertised a Flower Garden, and +he had tried to give the public something as closely resembling a +flower-garden as it was possible for an overcrowded, overheated, +overnoisy Broadway dancing-resort to achieve. Paper roses festooned +the walls; genuine tulips bloomed in tubs by every pillar; and from +the roof hung cages with birds in them. One of these, stirred by the +sudden cessation of the tumult below, had began to sing.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +had often pitied these birds, and more than once had pleaded in vain +with Abrahams for a remission of their sentence, but somehow at this +moment it did not occur to her that this one was merely praying in +its own language, as she often had prayed in her thoughts, to be +taken out of this place. To her, sitting there wrestling with Fate, +the song seemed cheerful. It soothed her. It healed her to listen +to it. And suddenly before her eyes there rose a vision of Monk’s +Crofton, cool, green, and peaceful under the mild English sun, luring +her as an oasis seen in the distance lures the desert traveller …</p> + +<p class="normal">She +became aware that the master of Monk’s Crofton had placed his +hand on hers and was holding it in a tightening grip. She looked +down and gave a little shiver. She had always disliked Bruce +Carmyle’s hands. They were strong and bony and black hair grew +on the back of them. One of the earliest feelings regarding him had +been that she would hate to have those hands touching her. But she +did not move. Again that vision of the old garden had flickered +across her mind... a haven where she could rest... +</p> + +<p class="normal">He +was leaning towards her, whispering in her ear. The room was hotter +than it had ever been, noisier than it had ever been, fuller than it +had ever been. The bird on the roof was singing again and now she +understood what it said. “Take me out of this!” Did +anything matter except that? What did it matter how one was taken, or +where, or by whom, so that one was taken.</p> + +<p class="normal">Monk’s +Crofton was looking cool and green and peaceful... +</p> + +<p class="normal">“Very well,” said Sally.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">3</h3> + +<p class="normal">Bruce +Carmyle, in the capacity of accepted suitor, found himself at +something of a loss. He had a dissatisfied feeling. It was not the +manner of Sally’s acceptance that caused this. It would, of +course, have pleased him better if she had shown more warmth, but he +was prepared to wait for warmth. What did trouble him was the fact +that his correct mind perceived now for the first time that he had +chosen an unsuitable moment and place for his outburst of emotion. +He belonged to the orthodox school of thought which looks on +moonlight and solitude as the proper setting for a proposal of +marriage; and the surroundings of the Flower Garden, for all its +nice-ness and the nice manner in which it was conducted, jarred upon +him profoundly.</p> + +<p class="normal">Music +had begun again, but it was not the soft music such as a lover +demands if he is to give of his best. It was a brassy, clashy +rendering of a ribald one-step, enough to choke the eloquence of the +most ardent. Couples were dipping and swaying and bumping into one +another as far as the eye could reach; while just behind him two +waiters had halted in order to thrash out one of those voluble +arguments in which waiters love to indulge. To continue the scene at +the proper emotional level was impossible, and Bruce Carmyle began +his career as an engaged man by dropping into Smalltalk.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Deuce +of a lot of noise,” he said querulously.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes,” +agreed Sally. +</p> + +<p class="normal">“Is +it always like this?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +yes.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Infernal +racket!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes.”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +romantic side of Mr. Carmyle’s nature could have cried aloud at +the hideous unworthiness of these banalities. In the visions which +he had had of himself as a successful wooer, it had always been in +the moments immediately succeeding the all-important question and its +whispered reply that he had come out particularly strong. He had +been accustomed to picture himself bending with a proud tenderness +over his partner in the scene and murmuring some notably good things +to her bowed head. How could any man murmur in a pandemonium like +this. From tenderness Bruce Carmyle descended with a sharp swoop to +irritability.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do +you often come here?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +for?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“To +dance.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Carmyle chafed helplessly. The scene, which should be so romantic, +had suddenly reminded him of the occasion when, at the age of twenty, +he had attended his first ball and had sat in a corner behind a +potted palm perspiring shyly and endeavouring to make conversation to +a formidable nymph in pink. It was one of the few occasions in his +life at which he had ever been at a complete disadvantage. He could +still remember the clammy discomfort of his too high collar as it +melted on him. Most certainly it was not a scene which he enjoyed +recalling; and that he should be forced to recall it now, at what +ought to have been the supreme moment of his life, annoyed him +intensely. Almost angrily he endeavoured to jerk the conversation to +a higher level.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Darling,” +he murmured, for by moving his chair two feet to the right and +bending sideways he found that he was in a position to murmur, “you +have made me so...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“<i>Batti, +batti! I presto ravioli hollandaise,” </i>cried one of the +disputing waiters at his back—or to Bruce Carmyle’s +prejudiced hearing it sounded like that.</p> + +<p class="normal">“<i>La +Donna e mobile spaghetti napoli Tettrazina,”</i> rejoined the +second waiter with spirit.</p> + +<p class="normal">“... +you have made me so...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“<i>Infanta +Isabella lope de Vegas mulligatawny Toronto,”</i> said the +first waiter, weak but coming back pluckily.</p> + +<p class="normal">“... +so happy...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“<i>Funiculi +funicula Vincente y Blasco Ibanez vermicelli sul campo della gloria +risotto!”</i> said the second waiter clinchingly, and scored a +technical knockout.</p> + +<p class="normal">Bruce +Carmyle gave it up, and lit a moody cigarette. He was oppressed by +that feeling which so many of us have felt in our time, that it was +all wrong.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +music stopped. The two leading citizens of Little Italy vanished and +went their way, probably to start a vendetta. There followed +comparative calm. But Bruce Carmyle’s emotions, like sweet +bells jangled, were out of tune, and he could not recapture the first +fine careless rapture. He found nothing within him but small-talk.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +has become of your party?” he asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">“My +party?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +people you are with,” said Mr. Carmyle. Even in the stress of +his emotion this problem had been exercising him. In his correctly +ordered world girls did not go to restaurants alone.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +not with anybody.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +came here by yourself?” exclaimed Bruce Carmyle, frankly +aghast. And, as he spoke, the wraith of Uncle Donald, banished till +now, returned as large as ever, puffing disapproval through a walrus +moustache.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +am employed here,” said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Carmyle started violently.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Employed +here?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“As +a dancer, you know. I...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +broke off, her attention abruptly diverted to something which had +just caught her eye at a table on the other side of the room. That +something was a red-headed young man of sturdy build who had just +appeared beside the chair in which Mr. Reginald Cracknell was sitting +in huddled gloom. In one hand he carried a basket, and from this +basket, rising above the din of conversation, there came a sudden +sharp yapping. Mr. Cracknell roused himself from his stupor, took +the basket, raised the lid. The yapping increased in volume.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Cracknell rose, the basket in his arms. With uncertain steps and a +look on his face like that of those who lead forlorn hopes he crossed +the floor to where Miss Mabel Hobson sat, proud and aloof. The next +moment that haughty lady, the centre of an admiring and curious +crowd, was hugging to her bosom a protesting Pekingese puppy, and Mr. +Cracknell, seizing his opportunity like a good general, had deposited +himself in a chair at her side. The course of true love was running +smooth again.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +red-headed young man was gazing fixedly at Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">“As +a dancer!” ejaculated Mr. Carmyle. Of all those within sight +of the moving drama which had just taken place, he alone had paid no +attention to it. Replete as it was with human interest, sex-appeal, +the punch, and all the other qualities which a drama should possess, +it had failed to grip him. His thoughts had been elsewhere. The +accusing figure of Uncle Donald refused to vanish from his mental +eye. The stern voice of Uncle Donald seemed still to ring in his +ear.</p> + +<p class="normal">A +dancer! A professional dancer at a Broadway restaurant! Hideous +doubts began to creep like snakes into Bruce Carmyle’s mind. +What, he asked himself, did he really know of this girl on whom he +had bestowed the priceless boon of his society for life? How did he +know what she was—he could not find the exact adjective to +express his meaning, but he knew what he meant. Was she worthy of +the boon? That was what it amounted to. All his life he had had a +prim shrinking from the section of the feminine world which is +connected with the light-life of large cities. Club acquaintances of +his in London had from time to time married into the Gaiety Chorus, +and Mr. Carmyle, though he had no objection to the Gaiety Chorus in +its proper place—on the other side of the footlights—had +always looked on these young men after as social outcasts. The fine +dashing frenzy which had brought him all the way from South Audley +Street to win Sally was ebbing fast.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally, +hearing him speak, had turned. And there was a candid honesty in her +gaze which for a moment sent all those creeping doubts scuttling away +into the darkness whence they had come. He had not made a fool of +himself, he protested to the lowering phantom of Uncle Donald. Who, +he demanded, could look at Sally and think for an instant that she +was not all that was perfect and lovable? A warm revulsion of feeling +swept over Bruce Carmyle like a returning tide.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +see, I lost my money and had to do something,” said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +see, I see,” murmured Mr. Carmyle; and if only Fate had left +him alone who knows to what heights of tenderness he might not have +soared? But at this moment Fate, being no respecter of persons, sent +into his life the disturbing personality of George Washington +Williams.</p> + +<p class="normal">George +Washington Williams was the talented coloured gentleman who had been +extracted from small-time vaudeville by Mr. Abrahams to do a nightly +speciality at the Flower Garden. He was, in fact, a trap-drummer: +and it was his amiable practice, after he had done a few minutes +trap-drumming, to rise from his seat and make a circular tour of the +tables on the edge of the dancing-floor, whimsically pretending to +clip the locks of the male patrons with a pair of drumsticks held +scissor-wise. And so it came about that, just as Mr. Carmyle was +bending towards Sally in an access of manly sentiment, and was on the +very verge of pouring out his soul in a series of well-phrased +remarks, he was surprised and annoyed to find an Ethiopian to whom he +had never been introduced leaning over him and taking quite +unpardonable liberties with his back hair.</p> + +<p class="normal">One +says that Mr. Carmyle was annoyed. The word is weak. The +interruption coming at such a moment jarred every ganglion in his +body. The clicking noise of the drumsticks maddened him. And the +gleaming whiteness of Mr. Williams’ friendly and benignant +smile was the last straw. His dignity writhed beneath this +abominable infliction. People at other tables were laughing. At +him. A loathing for the Flower Garden flowed over Bruce Carmyle, and +with it a feeling of suspicion and disapproval of everyone connected +with the establishment. He sprang to his feet.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +think I will be going,” he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +did not reply. She was watching Ginger, who still stood beside the +table recently vacated by Reginald Cracknell .</p> + +<p class="normal">“Good +night,” said Mr. Carmyle between his teeth.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +are you going?” said Sally with a start. She felt embarrassed. + Try as she would, she was unable to find words of any intimacy. She +tried to realize that she had promised to marry this man, but never +before had he seemed so much a stranger to her, so little a part of +her life. It came to her with a sensation of the incredible that she +had done this thing, taken this irrevocable step.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +sudden sight of Ginger had shaken her. It was as though in the last +half-hour she had forgotten him and only now realized what marriage +with Bruce Carmyle would mean to their comradeship. From now on he +was dead to her. If anything in this world was certain that was. +Sally Nicholas was Ginger’s pal, but Mrs. Carmyle, she +realized, would never be allowed to see him again. A devastating +feeling of loss smote her like a blow.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +I’ve had enough of this place,” Bruce Carmyle was saying.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Good +night,” said Sally. She hesitated. “When shall I see +you?” she asked awkwardly.</p> + +<p class="normal">It +occurred to Bruce Carmyle that he was not showing himself at his +best. He had, he perceived, allowed his nerves to run away with him.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +don’t mind if I go?” he said more amiably. “The +fact is, I can’t stand this place any longer. I’ll tell +you one thing, I’m going to take you out of here quick.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +afraid I can’t leave at a moment’s notice,” said +Sally, loyal to her obligations.</p> + +<p class="normal">“We’ll +talk over that to-morrow. I’ll call for you in the morning and +take you for a drive somewhere in a car. You want some fresh air +after this.” Mr. Carmyle looked about him in stiff disgust, and +expressed his unalterable sentiments concerning the Flower Garden, +that apple of Isadore Abrahams’ eye, in a snort of loathing. +“My God! What a place!”</p> + +<p class="normal">He +walked quickly away and disappeared. And Ginger, beaming happily, +swooped on Sally’s table like a homing pigeon.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">4</h3> + +<p class="normal">“Good +Lord, I say, what ho!” cried Ginger. “Fancy meeting you +here. What a bit of luck!” He glanced over his shoulder +warily. “Has that blighter pipped?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Pipped?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Popped,” +explained Ginger. “I mean to say, he isn’t coming back +or any rot like that, is he?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Mr. +Carmyle? No, he has gone.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Sound +egg!” said Ginger with satisfaction. “For a moment, when +I saw you yarning away together, I thought he might be with your +party. What on earth is he doing over here at all, confound him? +He’s got all Europe to play about in, why should he come +infesting New York? I say, it really is ripping, seeing you again. +It seems years... Of course, one get’s a certain amount of +satisfaction writing letters, but it’s not the same. Besides, +I write such rotten letters. I say, this really is rather priceless. + Can’t I get you something? A cup of coffee, I mean, or an egg +or something? By jove! this really is top-hole.”</p> + +<p class="normal">His +homely, honest face glowed with pleasure, and it seemed to Sally as +though she had come out of a winter’s night into a warm +friendly room. Her mercurial spirits soared<i>.</i></p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +Ginger! If you knew what it’s like seeing you!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No, +really? Do you mean, honestly, you’re braced?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +should say I am braced.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +isn’t that fine! I was afraid you might have forgotten me.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Forgotten +you!”</p> + +<p class="normal">With +something of the effect of a revelation it suddenly struck Sally how +far she had been from forgetting him, how large was the place he had +occupied in her thoughts.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ve +missed you dreadfully,” she said, and felt the words inadequate +as she uttered them.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +ho!” said Ginger, also internally condemning the poverty of +speech as a vehicle for conveying thought.</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was a brief silence. The first exhilaration of the reunion over, +Sally deep down in her heart was aware of a troubled feeling as +though the world were out of joint. She forced herself to ignore it, +but it would not be ignored. It grew. Dimly she was beginning to +realize what Ginger meant to her, and she fought to keep herself from +realizing it. Strange things were happening to her to-night, strange +emotions stirring her. Ginger seemed somehow different, as if she +were really seeing him for the first time.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’re +looking wonderfully well,” she said trying to keep the +conversation on a pedestrian level.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +<i>am</i> well,” said Ginger. “Never felt fitter in my +life. Been out in the open all day long... simple life and all +that... working like blazes. I say, business is booming. Did you +see me just now, handing over Percy the Pup to what’s-his-name? +Five hundred dollars on that one deal. Got the cheque in my pocket. +But what an extraordinarily rummy thing that I should have come to +this place to deliver the goods just when you happened to be here. I +couldn’t believe my eyes at first. I say, I hope the people +you’re with won’t think I’m butting in. You’ll +have to explain that we’re old pals and that you started me in +business and all that sort of thing. Look here,” he said +lowering his voice, “I know how you hate being thanked, but I +simply must say how terrifically decent...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Miss +Nicholas.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Lee +Schoenstein was standing at the table, and by his side an expectant +youth with a small moustache and pince-nez. Sally got up, and the +next moment Ginger was alone, gaping perplexedly after her as she +vanished and reappeared in the jogging throng on the dancing floor. +It was the nearest thing Ginger had seen to a conjuring trick, and at +that moment he was ill-attuned to conjuring tricks. He brooded, +fuming, at what seemed to him the supremest exhibition of pure cheek, +of monumental nerve, and of undiluted crust that had ever come within +his notice. To come and charge into a private conversation like that +and whisk her away without a word... +</p> + +<p class="normal">“Who +<i>was</i> that blighter?” he demanded with heat, when the +music ceased and Sally limped back.</p> + +<p class="normal">“That +was Mr. Schoenstein.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +who was the other?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +one I danced with? I don’t know.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +don’t <i>know?”</i></p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +perceived that the conversation had arrived at an embarrassing point. + There was nothing for it but candour.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ginger,” +she said, “you remember my telling you when we first met that I +used to dance in a Broadway place? This is the place. I’m +working again.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Complete +unintelligence showed itself on Ginger’s every feature.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +don’t understand,” he said—unnecessarily, for his +face revealed the fact.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ve +got my old job back.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +why?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +I had to do something.” She went on rapidly. Already a light +dimly resembling the light of understanding was beginning to appear +in Ginger’s eyes. “Fillmore went smash, you know—it +wasn’t his fault, poor dear. He had the worst kind of luck—and +most of my money was tied up in his business, so you see...”</p> + +<p class="normal">She +broke off confused by the look in his eyes, conscious of an absurd +feeling of guilt. There was amazement in that look and a sort of +incredulous horror.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do +you mean to say...” Ginger gulped and started again. “Do +you mean to tell me that you let me have... all that money... for the +dog-business... when you were broke? Do you mean to say...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +stole a glance at his crimson face and looked away again quickly. +There was an electric silence.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Look +here,” exploded Ginger with sudden violence, “you’ve +got to marry me. You’ve jolly well got to marry me! I don’t +mean that,” he added quickly. “I mean to say I know +you’re going to marry whoever you please... but <i>won’t</i> +you marry me? Sally, for God’s sake have a dash at it! I’ve +been keeping it in all this time because it seemed rather rotten to +bother you about it, but now... .Oh, dammit, I wish I could put it +into words. I always was rotten at talking. But... well, look here, +what I mean is, I know I’m not much of a chap, but it seems to +me you must care for me a bit to do a thing like that for a fellow... +and... I’ve loved you like the dickens ever since I met you... +I do wish you’d have a stab at it, Sally. At least I could +look after you, you know, and all that... I mean to say, work like +the deuce and try to give you a good time... I’m not such an +ass as to think a girl like you could ever really... er... <i>love</i> +a blighter like me, but...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +laid her hand oh his.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ginger, +dear,” she said, “I do love you. I ought to have known +it all along, but I seem to be understanding myself to-night for the +first time.” She got up and bent over him for a swift moment, +whispering in his ear, “I shall never love anyone but you, +Ginger. Will you try to remember that.” She was moving away, +but he caught at her arm and stopped her.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Sally...”</p> + +<p class="normal">She +pulled her arm away, her face working as she fought against the tears +that would not keep back.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ve +made a fool of myself,” she said. “Ginger, your +cousin... Mr. Carmyle... just now he asked me to marry him, and I +said I would.”</p> + +<p class="normal">She +was gone, flitting among the tables like some wild creature running +to its home: and Ginger, motionless, watched her go.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">5</h3> + +<p class="normal">The +telephone-bell in Sally’s little sitting-room was ringing +jerkily as she let herself in at the front door. She guessed who it +was at the other end of the wire, and the noise of the bell sounded +to her like the voice of a friend in distress crying for help. +Without stopping to close the door, she ran to the table and unhooked +the receiver. Muffled, plaintive sounds were comming over the wire.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Hullo... +Hullo... I say... Hullo...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Hullo, +Ginger,” said Sally quietly.</p> + +<p class="normal">An +ejaculation that was half a shout and half gurgle answered her.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Sally! +Is that you?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +here I am, Ginger.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ve +been trying to get you for ages.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ve +only just come in. I walked home.”</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was a pause.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Hullo.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +I mean...” Ginger seemed to be finding his usual difficulty in +expressing himself. “About that, you know. What you said.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes?” +said Sally, trying to keep her voice from shaking.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You +said...” Again Ginger’s vocabulary failed him. “You +said you loved me.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes,” +said Sally simply.</p> + +<p class="normal">Another +odd sound floated over the wire, and there was a moment of silence +before Ginger found himself able to resume.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I... +I... Well, we can talk about that when we meet. I mean, it’s +no good trying to say what I think over the ‘phone, I’m +sort of knocked out. I never dreamed... But, I say, what did you +mean about Bruce?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +told you, I told you.” Sally’s face was twisted and the +receiver shook in her hand. “I’ve made a fool of myself. + I never realized... And now it’s too late.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Good +God!” Ginger’s voice rose in a sharp wail. “You +can’t mean you really... You don’t seriously intend to +marry the man?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +must. I’ve promised.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But, +good heavens...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +no good. I must.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +the man’s a blighter!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +can’t break my word.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +never heard such rot,” said Ginger vehemently. “Of +course you can. A girl isn’t expected...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +can’t, Ginger dear, I really can’t.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“But +look here...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +really no good talking about it any more, really it isn’t... +Where are you staying to-night?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Staying? +Me? At the Plaza. But look here...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +found herself laughing weakly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“At +the Plaza! Oh, Ginger, you really do want somebody to look after you. + Squandering your pennies like that... Well, don’t talk any +more now. It’s so late and I’m so tired. I’ll +come and see you to-morrow. Good night.”</p> + +<p class="normal">She +hung up the receiver quickly, to cut short a fresh outburst of +protest. And as she turned away a voice spoke behind her.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Sally!”</p> + +<p class="normal">Gerald +Foster was standing in the doorway.</p> + +<h3 class="chap">CHAPTER XVII</h3> + +<h3 class="titl">SALLY LAYS A GHOST</h3> + +<h3 class="sect">1</h3> + +<p class="normal">The +blood flowed slowly back into Sally’s face, and her heart, +which had leaped madly for an instant at the sound of his voice, +resumed its normal beat. The suddenness of the shock over, she was +surprised to find herself perfectly calm. Always when she had +imagined this meeting, knowing that it would have to take place +sooner or later, she had felt something akin to panic: but now that +it had actually occurred it hardly seemed to stir her. The events of +the night had left her incapable of any violent emotion.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Hullo, +Sally!” said Gerald.</p> + +<p class="normal">He +spoke thickly, and there was a foolish smile on his face as he stood +swaying with one hand on the door. He was in his shirt-sleeves, +collarless: and it was plain that he had been drinking heavily. His +face was white and puffy, and about him there hung like a nimbus a +sodden disreputableness.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +did not speak. Weighed down before by a numbing exhaustion, she +seemed now to have passed into that second phase in which over-tired +nerves enter upon a sort of Indian summer of abnormal alertness. She +looked at him quietly, coolly and altogether dispassionately, as if +he had been a stranger.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Hullo!” +said Gerald again.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +do you want?” said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Heard +your voice. Saw the door open. Thought I’d come in.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +do you want?”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +weak smile which had seemed pinned on Gerald’s face vanished. +A tear rolled down his cheek. His intoxication had reached the +maudlin stage.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Sally... +S-Sally... I’m very miserable.” He slurred awkwardly over +the difficult syllables. “Heard your voice. Saw the door +open. Thought I’d come in.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Something +flicked at the back of Sally’s mind. She seemed to have been +through all this before. Then she remembered. This was simply Mr. +Reginald Cracknell over again.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +think you had better go to bed, Gerald,” she said steadily. +Nothing about him seemed to touch her now, neither the sight of him +nor his shameless misery.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What’s +the use? Can’t sleep. No good. Couldn’t sleep. Sally, +you don’t know how worried I am. I see what a fool I’ve +been.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +made a quick gesture, to check what she supposed was about to develop +into a belated expression of regret for his treatment of herself. +She did not want to stand there listening to Gerald apologizing with +tears for having done his best to wreck her life. But it seemed that +it was not this that was weighing upon his soul.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +was a fool ever to try writing plays,” he went on. “Got +a winner first time, but can’t repeat. It’s no good. +Ought to have stuck to newspaper work. I’m good at that. +Shall have to go back to it. Had another frost to-night. No good +trying any more. Shall have to go back to the old grind, damn it.”</p> + +<p class="normal">He +wept softly, full of pity for his hard case.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Very +miserable,” he murmured.</p> + +<p class="normal">He +came forward a step into the room, lurched, and retreated to the safe +support of the door. For an instant Sally’s artificial calm +was shot through by a swift stab of contempt. It passed, and she was +back again in her armour of indifference.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Go +to bed, Gerald,” she said. “You’ll feel better in +the morning.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Perhaps +some inkling of how he was going to feel in the morning worked +through to Gerald’s muddled intelligence, for he winced, and +his manner took on a deeper melancholy.</p> + +<p class="normal">“May +not be alive in the morning,” he said solemnly. “Good +mind to end it all. End it all!” he repeated with the +beginning of a sweeping gesture which was cut off abruptly as he +clutched at the friendly door.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +was not in the mood for melodrama.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +go to bed,” she said impatiently. The strange frozen +indifference which had gripped her was beginning to pass, leaving in +its place a growing feeling of resentment—resentment against +Gerald for degrading himself like this, against herself for ever +having found glamour in the man. It humiliated her to remember how +utterly she had once allowed his personality to master hers. And +under the sting of this humiliation she felt hard and pitiless. +Dimly she was aware that a curious change had come over her to-night. + Normally, the sight of any living thing in distress was enough to +stir her quick sympathy: but Gerald mourning over the prospect of +having to go back to regular work made no appeal to her—a fact +which the sufferer noted and commented upon.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’re +very unsymp... unsympathetic,” he complained.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’m +sorry,” said Sally. She walked briskly to the door and gave it +a push. Gerald, still clinging to his chosen support, moved out into +the passage, attached to the handle, with the air of a man the +foundations of whose world have suddenly lost their stability. He +released the handle and moved uncertainly across the passage. +Finding his own door open before him, he staggered over the +threshold; and Sally, having watched him safely to his journey’s +end, went into her bedroom with the intention of terminating this +disturbing night by going to sleep.</p> + +<p class="normal">Almost +immediately she changed her mind. Sleep was out of the question. A +fever of restlessness had come upon her. She put on a kimono, and +went into the kitchen to ascertain whether her commissariat +arrangements would permit of a glass of hot milk.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +had just remembered that she had that morning presented the last of +the milk to a sandy cat with a purposeful eye which had dropped in +through the window to take breakfast with her, when her regrets for +this thriftless hospitality were interrupted by a muffled crash.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +listened intently. The sound had seemed to come from across the +passage. She hurried to the door and opened it. As she did so, from +behind the door of the apartment opposite there came a perfect +fusillade of crashes, each seeming to her strained hearing louder and +more appalling than the last.</p> + +<p class="normal">There +is something about sudden, loud noises in the stillness of the night +which shatters the most rigid detachment. A short while before, +Gerald, toying with the idea of ending his sorrows by violence, had +left Sally unmoved: but now her mind leapt back to what he had said, +and apprehension succeeded indifference. There was no disputing the +fact that Gerald was in an irresponsible mood, under the influence of +which he was capable of doing almost anything. Sally, listening in +the doorway, felt a momentary panic.</p> + +<p class="normal">A +brief silence had succeeded the fusillade, but, as she stood there +hesitating, the noise broke out again; and this time it was so loud +and compelling that Sally hesitated no longer. She ran across the +passage and beat on the door.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">2</h3> + +<p class="normal">Whatever +devastating happenings had been going on in his home, it was plain a +moment later that Gerald had managed to survive them: for there came +the sound of a dragging footstep, and the door opened. Gerald stood +on the threshold, the weak smile back on his face.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Hullo, +Sally!”</p> + +<p class="normal">At +the sight of him, disreputable and obviously unscathed, Sally’s +brief alarm died away, leaving in its place the old feeling of +impatient resentment. In addition to her other grievances against +him, he had apparently frightened her unnecessarily.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Whatever +was all that noise?” she demanded.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Noise?” +said Gerald, considering the point open-mouthed.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes, +noise,” snapped Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ve +been cleaning house,” said Gerald with the owl-like gravity of +a man just conscious that he is not wholly himself.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +pushed her way past him. The apartment in which she found herself +was almost an exact replica of her own, and it was evident that Elsa +Doland had taken pains to make it pretty and comfortable in a niggly +feminine way. Amateur interior decoration had always been a hobby of +hers. Even in the unpromising surroundings of her bedroom at Mrs. +Meecher’s boarding-house she had contrived to create a certain +daintiness which Sally, who had no ability in that direction herself, +had always rather envied. As a decorator Elsa’s mind ran in +the direction of small, fragile ornaments, and she was not afraid of +over-furnishing. Pictures jostled one another on the walls: china of +all description stood about on little tables: there was a profusion +of lamps with shades of parti-coloured glass: and plates were ranged +along a series of shelves.</p> + +<p class="normal">One +says that the plates were ranged and the pictures jostled one +another, but it would be more correct to put it they had jostled and +had been ranged, for it was only by guess-work that Sally was able to +reconstruct the scene as it must have appeared before Gerald had +started, as he put it, to clean house. She had walked into the flat +briskly enough, but she pulled up short as she crossed the threshold, +appalled by the majestic ruin that met her gaze. A shell bursting in +the little sitting-room could hardly have created more havoc.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +psychology of a man of weak character under the influence of alcohol +and disappointed ambition is not easy to plumb, for his moods follow +one another with a rapidity which baffles the observer. Ten minutes +before, Gerald Foster had been in the grip of a clammy self-pity, and +it seemed from his aspect at the present moment that this phase had +returned. But in the interval there had manifestly occurred a brief +but adequate spasm of what would appear to have been an almost +Berserk fury. What had caused it and why it should have expended +itself so abruptly, Sally was not psychologist enough to explain; but +that it had existed there was ocular evidence of the most convincing +kind. A heavy niblick, flung petulantly—or remorsefully—into +a corner, showed by what medium the destruction had been +accomplished.</p> + +<p class="normal">Bleak +chaos appeared on every side. The floor was littered with every +imaginable shape and size of broken glass and china. Fragments of +pictures, looking as if they had been chewed by some prehistoric +animal, lay amid heaps of shattered statuettes and vases. As Sally +moved slowly into the room after her involuntary pause, china +crackled beneath her feet. She surveyed the stripped walls with a +wondering eye, and turned to Gerald for an explanation.</p> + +<p class="normal">Gerald +had subsided on to an occasional table, and was weeping softly again. + It had come over him once more that he had been very, very badly +treated.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well!” +said Sally with a gasp. “You’ve certainly made a good +job of it!”</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was a sharp crack as the occasional table, never designed by its +maker to bear heavy weights, gave way in a splintering flurry of +broken legs under the pressure of the master of the house: and +Sally’s mood underwent an abrupt change. There are few +situations in life which do not hold equal potentialities for both +tragedy and farce, and it was the ludicrous side of this drama that +chanced to appeal to Sally at this moment. Her sense of humour was +tickled. It was, if she could have analysed her feelings, at herself +that she was mocking—at the feeble sentimental Sally who had +once conceived the absurd idea of taking this preposterous man +seriously. She felt light-hearted and light-headed, and she sank +into a chair with a gurgling laugh.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +shock of his fall appeared to have had the desirable effect of +restoring Gerald to something approaching intelligence. He picked +himself up from the remains of a set of water-colours, gazing at +Sally with growing disapproval.</p> + +<p class="normal">“No +sympathy,” he said austerely.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +can’t help it,” cried Sally. “It’s too +funny.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Not +funny,” corrected Gerald, his brain beginning to cloud once +more.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +did you do it for?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Gerald +returned for a moment to that mood of honest indignation, which had +so strengthened his arm when wielding the niblick. He bethought him +once again of his grievance.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Wasn’t +going to stand for it any longer,” he said heatedly. “A +fellow’s wife goes and lets him down... ruins his show by going +off and playing in another show... why <i>shouldn’t</i> I smash +her things? Why should I stand for that sort of treatment? Why should +I?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +you haven’t,” said Sally, “so there’s no need +to discuss it. You seem to have acted in a thoroughly manly and +independent way.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“That’s +it. Manly independent.” He waggled his finger impressively. +“Don’t care what she says,” he continued. “Don’t +care if she never comes back. That woman...”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +was not prepared to embark with him upon a discussion of the absent +Elsa. Already the amusing aspect of the affair had begun to fade, +and her hilarity was giving way to a tired distaste for the +sordidness of the whole business. She had become aware that she +could not endure the society of Gerald Foster much longer. She got +up and spoke decidedly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“And +now,” she said, “I’m going to tidy up.”</p> + +<p class="normal">Gerald +had other views.</p> + +<p class="normal">“No,” +he said with sudden solemnity. “No! Nothing of the kind. +Leave it for her to find. Leave it as it is.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Don’t +be silly. All this has got to be cleaned up. I’ll do it. You +go and sit in my apartment. I’ll come and tell you when you +can come back.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No!” +said Gerald, wagging his head.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +stamped her foot among the crackling ruins. Quite suddenly the sight +of him had become intolerable.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do +as I tell you,” she cried.</p> + +<p class="normal">Gerald +wavered for a moment, but his brief militant mood was ebbing fast. +After a faint protest he shuffled off, and Sally heard him go into +her room. She breathed a deep breath of relief and turned to her +task.</p> + +<p class="normal">A +visit to the kitchen revealed a long-handled broom, and, armed with +this, Sally was soon busy. She was an efficient little person, and +presently out of chaos there began to emerge a certain order. +Nothing short of complete re-decoration would ever make the place +look habitable again, but at the end of half an hour she had cleared +the floor, and the fragments of vases, plates, lamp-shades, pictures +and glasses were stacked in tiny heaps against the walls. She +returned the broom to the kitchen, and, going back into the +sitting-room, flung open the window and stood looking out.</p> + +<p class="normal">With +a sense of unreality she perceived that the night had gone. Over the +quiet street below there brooded that strange, metallic light which +ushers in the dawn of a fine day. A cold breeze whispered to and +fro. Above the house-tops the sky was a faint, level blue.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +left the window and started to cross the room. And suddenly there +came over her a feeling of utter weakness. She stumbled to a chair, +conscious only of being tired beyond the possibility of a further +effort. Her eyes closed, and almost before her head had touched the +cushions she was asleep.</p> + +<h3 class="sect">3</h3> + +<p class="normal">Sally +woke. Sunshine was streaming through the open window, and with it +the myriad noises of a city awake and about its business. Footsteps +clattered on the sidewalk, automobile horns were sounding, and she +could hear the clank of street cars as they passed over the points. +She could only guess at the hour, but it was evident that the morning +was well advanced. She got up stiffly. Her head was aching.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +went into the bathroom, bathed her face, and felt better. The dull +oppression which comes of a bad night was leaving her. She leaned +out of the window, revelling in the fresh air, then crossed the +passage and entered her own apartment. Stertorous breathing greeted +her, and she perceived that Gerald Foster had also passed the night +in a chair. He was sprawling by the window with his legs stretched +out and his head resting on one of the arms, an unlovely spectacle.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +stood regarding him for a moment with a return of the distaste which +she had felt on the previous night. And yet, mingled with the +distaste, there was a certain elation. A black chapter of her life +was closed for ever. Whatever the years to come might bring to her, +they would be free from any wistful yearnings for the man who had +once been woven so inextricably into the fabric of her life. She had +thought that his personality had gripped her too strongly ever to be +dislodged, but now she could look at him calmly and feel only a faint +half-pity, half-contempt. The glamour had departed.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +shook him gently, and he sat up with a start, blinking in the strong +light. His mouth was still open. He stared at Sally foolishly, then +scrambled awkwardly out of the chair.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +my God!” said Gerald, pressing both his hands to his forehead +and sitting down again. He licked his lips with a dry tongue and +moaned. “Oh, I’ve got a headache!”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +might have pointed out to him that he had certainly earned one, but +she refrained.</p> + +<p class="normal">“You’d +better go and have a wash,” she suggested.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Yes,” +said Gerald, heaving himself up again.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Would +you like some breakfast?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Don’t!” +said Gerald faintly, and tottered off to the bathroom.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +sat down in the chair he had vacated. She had never felt quite like +this before in her life. Everything seemed dreamlike. The splashing +of water in the bathroom came faintly to her, and she realized that +she had been on the point of falling asleep again. She got up and +opened the window, and once more the air acted as a restorative. She +watched the activities of the street with a distant interest. They, +too, seemed dreamlike and unreal. People were hurrying up and down +on mysterious errands. An inscrutable cat picked its way daintily +across the road. At the door of the apartment house an open car +purred sleepily.</p> + +<p class="normal">She +was roused by a ring at the bell. She went to the door and opened +it, and found Bruce Carmyle standing on the threshold. He wore a +light motor-coat, and he was plainly endeavouring to soften the +severity of his saturnine face with a smile of beaming kindliness.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Well, +here I am!” said Bruce Carmyle cheerily. “Are you +ready?”</p> + +<p class="normal">With +the coming of daylight a certain penitence had descended on Mr. +Carmyle. Thinking things over while shaving and subsequently in his +bath, he had come to the conclusion that his behaviour overnight had +not been all that could have been desired. He had not actually been +brutal, perhaps, but he had undoubtedly not been winning. There had +been an abruptness in the manner of his leaving Sally at the Flower +Garden which a perfect lover ought not to have shown. He had allowed +his nerves to get the better of him, and now he desired to make +amends. Hence a cheerfulness which he did not usually exhibit so +early in the morning.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +was staring at him blankly. She had completely forgotten that he had +said that he would come and take her for a drive this morning. She +searched in her mind for words, and found none. And, as Mr. Carmyle +was debating within himself whether to kiss her now or wait for a +more suitable moment, embarrassment came upon them both like a fog, +and the genial smile faded from his face as if the motive-power +behind it had suddenly failed.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I’ve—er—got +the car outside, and...”</p> + +<p class="normal">At +this point speech failed Mr. Carmyle, for, even as he began the +sentence, the door that led to the bathroom opened and Gerald Foster +came out. Mr. Carmyle gaped at Gerald: Gerald gaped at Mr. Carmyle.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +application of cold water to the face and head is an excellent thing +on the morning after an imprudent night, but as a tonic it only goes +part of the way. In the case of Gerald Foster, which was an +extremely serious and aggravated case, it had gone hardly any way at +all. The person unknown who had been driving red-hot rivets into the +base of Gerald Foster’s skull ever since the moment of his +awakening was still busily engaged on that task. He gazed at Mr. +Carmyle wanly.</p> + +<p class="normal">Bruce +Carmyle drew in his breath with a sharp hiss, and stood rigid. His +eyes, burning now with a grim light, flickered over Gerald’s +person and found nothing in it to entertain them. He saw a slouching +figure in shirt-sleeves and the foundations of evening dress, a +disgusting, degraded figure with pink eyes and a white face that +needed a shave. And all the doubts that had ever come to vex Mr. +Carmyle’s mind since his first meeting with Sally became on the +instant certainties. So Uncle Donald had been right after all! This +was the sort of girl she was!</p> + +<p class="normal">At +his elbow the stout phantom of Uncle Donald puffed with satisfaction.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +told you so!” it said.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +had not moved. The situation was beyond her. Just as if this had +really been the dream it seemed, she felt incapable of speech or +action.</p> + +<p class="normal">“So...” +said Mr. Carmyle, becoming articulate, and allowed an impressive +aposiopesis to take the place of the rest of the speech. A cold fury +had gripped him. He pointed at Gerald, began to speak, found that he +was stuttering, and gulped back the words. In this supreme moment he +was not going to have his dignity impaired by a stutter. He gulped +and found a sentence which, while brief enough to insure against this +disaster, was sufficiently long to express his meaning.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Get +out!” he said.</p> + +<p class="normal">Gerald +Foster had his dignity, too, and it seemed to him that the time had +come to assert it. But he also had a most excruciating headache, and +when he drew himself up haughtily to ask Mr. Carmyle what the devil +he meant by it, a severe access of pain sent him huddling back +immediately to a safer attitude. He clasped his forehead and +groaned.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Get +out!”</p> + +<p class="normal">For +a moment Gerald hesitated. Then another sudden shooting spasm +convinced him that no profit or pleasure was to be derived from a +continuance of the argument, and he began to shamble slowly across to +the door. Bruce Carmyle watched him go with twitching hands. There +was a moment when the human man in him, somewhat atrophied from long +disuse, stirred him almost to the point of assault; then dignity +whispered more prudent counsel in his ear, and Gerald was past the +danger-zone and out in the passage. Mr. Carmyle turned to face +Sally, as King Arthur on a similar but less impressive occasion must +have turned to deal with Guinevere.</p> + +<p class="normal">“So...” +he said again.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +was eyeing him steadily—considering the circumstances, Mr. +Carmyle thought with not a little indignation, much too steadily.</p> + +<p class="normal">“This,” +he said ponderously, “is very amusing.”</p> + +<p class="normal">He +waited for her to speak, but she said nothing.</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +might have expected it,” said Mr. Carmyle with a bitter laugh.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +forced herself from the lethargy which was gripping her.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Would +you like me to explain?” she said.</p> + +<p class="normal">“There +can be no explanation,” said Mr. Carmyle coldly.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Very +well,” said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">There +was a pause.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Good-bye,” +said Bruce Carmyle.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Good-bye,” +said Sally.</p> + +<p class="normal">Mr. +Carmyle walked to the door. There he stopped for an instant and +glanced back at her. Sally had walked to the window and was looking +out. For one swift instant something about her trim little figure +and the gleam of her hair where the sunlight shone on it seemed to +catch at Bruce Carmyle’s heart, and he wavered. But the next +moment he was strong again, and the door had closed behind him with a +resolute bang.</p> + +<p class="normal">Out +in the street, climbing into his car, he looked up involuntarily to +see if she was still there, but she had gone. As the car, gathering +speed, hummed down the street. Sally was at the telephone listening +to the sleepy voice of Ginger Kemp, which, as he became aware who it +was that had woken him from his rest and what she had to say to him, +magically lost its sleepiness and took on a note of riotous ecstasy.</p> + +<p class="normal">Five +minutes later, Ginger was splashing in his bath, singing +discordantly.</p> + +<h3 class="chap">CHAPTER XVIII</h3> + +<h3 class="titl">JOURNEY‘S END</h3> + +<p class="normal">Darkness +was beginning to gather slowly and with almost an apologetic +air, as if it regretted the painful duty of putting an end to the +perfect summer day. Over to the west beyond the trees there still +lingered a faint afterglow, and a new moon shone like a silver sickle +above the big barn. Sally came out of the house and bowed gravely +three times for luck. She stood on the gravel, outside the porch, +drinking in the sweet evening scents, and found life good.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +darkness, having shown a certain reluctance at the start, was now +buckling down to make a quick and thorough job of it. The sky turned +to a uniform dark blue, picked out with quiet stars. The cement of +the state road which led to Patchogue, Babylon, and other important +centres ceased to be a pale blur and became invisible. Lights +appeared in the windows of the houses across the meadows. From the +direction of the kennels there came a single sleepy bark, and the +small white woolly dog which had scampered out at Sally’s heels +stopped short and uttered a challenging squeak.</p> + +<p class="normal">The +evening was so still that Ginger’s footsteps, as he pounded +along the road on his way back from the village, whither he had gone +to buy provisions, evening papers, and wool for the sweater which +Sally was knitting, were audible long before he turned in at the +gate. Sally could not see him, but she looked in the direction of +the sound and once again felt that pleasant, cosy thrill of happiness +which had come to her every evening for the last year.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ginger,” +she called.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +ho!”</p> + +<p class="normal">The +woolly dog, with another important squeak, scuttled down the drive to +look into the matter, and was coldly greeted. Ginger, for all his +love of dogs, had never been able to bring himself to regard Toto +with affection. He had protested when Sally, a month before, finding +Mrs. Meecher distraught on account of a dreadful lethargy which had +seized her pet, had begged him to offer hospitality and country air +to the invalid.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +wonderful what you’ve done for Toto, angel,” said Sally, +as he came up frigidly eluding that curious animal’s leaps of +welcome. “He’s a different dog.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Bit +of luck for him,” said Ginger.</p> + +<p class="normal">“In +all the years I was at Mrs. Meecher’s I never knew him move at +anything more rapid than a stately walk. Now he runs about all the +time.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“The +blighter had been overeating from birth,” said Ginger. “That +was all that was wrong with him. A little judicious dieting put him +right. We’ll be able,” said Ginger brightening, “to +ship him back next week.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +shall quite miss him.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +nearly missed him—this morning—with a shoe,” said +Ginger. “He was up on the kitchen table wolfing the bacon, and +I took steps.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“My +cave-man!” murmured Sally. “I always said you had a +frightfully brutal streak in you. Ginger, what an evening!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Good +Lord!” said Ginger suddenly, as they walked into the light of +the open kitchen door.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Now +what?”</p> + +<p class="normal">He +stopped and eyed her intently.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Do +you know you’re looking prettier than you were when I started +down to the village!”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +gave his arm a little hug.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Beloved!” +she said. “Did you get the chops?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +froze in his tracks, horrified.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +my aunt! I clean forgot them!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Oh, +Ginger, you are an old chump. Well, you’ll have to go in for a +little judicious dieting, like Toto.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +say, I’m most awfully sorry. I got the wool.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“If +you think I’m going to eat wool...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Isn’t +there anything in the house?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Vegetables +and fruit.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Fine! +But, of course, if you want chops...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Not +at all. I’m spiritual. Besides, people say that vegetables +are good for the blood-pressure or something. Of course you forgot +to get the mail, too?”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Absolutely +not! I was on to it like a knife. Two letters from fellows wanting +Airedale puppies.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“No! +Ginger, we <i>are</i> getting on!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Pretty +bloated,” agreed Ginger complacently. “Pretty bloated. +We’ll be able to get that two-seater if things go buzzing on +like this. There was a letter for you. Here it is.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +from Fillmore,” said Sally, examining the envelope as they went +into the kitchen. “And about time, too. I haven’t had a +word from him for months.”</p> + +<p class="normal">She +sat down and opened the letter. Ginger, heaving himself on to the +table, wriggled into a position of comfort and started to read his +evening paper. But after he had skimmed over the sporting page he +lowered it and allowed his gaze to rest on Sally’s bent head +with a feeling of utter contentment.</p> + +<p class="normal">Although +a married man of nearly a year’s standing, Ginger was still +moving about a magic world in a state of dazed incredulity, unable +fully to realize that such bliss could be. Ginger in his time had +seen many things that looked good from a distance, but not one that +had borne the test of a closer acquaintance—except this +business of marriage.</p> + +<p class="normal">Marriage, +with Sally for a partner, seemed to be one of the very few things in +the world in which there was no catch. His honest eyes glowed as he +watched her. Sally broke into a little splutter of laughter.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Ginger, +look at this!”</p> + +<p class="normal">He +reached down and took the slip of paper which she held out to him. +The following legend met his eye, printed in bold letters:</p> + +<p class="center">POPP’S</p> + +<p class="center">OUTSTANDING</p> + +<p class="center">SUCCULENT——APPETIZING——NUTRITIOUS.</p> + +<p class="center"><br></p> + +<p class="center">(JUST SAY “POP!” A CHILD</p> + +<p class="center">CAN DO IT.)</p> + +<p class="normal"><br></p> + +<p class="normal">Ginger +regarded this cipher with a puzzled frown.</p> + +<p class="normal">“What +is it?” he asked.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +Fillmore.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“How +do you mean?”</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally +gurgled .</p> + +<p class="normal">“Fillmore +and Gladys have started a little restaurant in Pittsburg.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“A +restaurant!” There was a shocked note in Ginger’s voice. +Although he knew that the managerial career of that modern Napoleon, +his brother-in-law, had terminated in something of a smash, he had +never quite lost his reverence for one whom he considered a bit of a +master-mind. That Fillmore Nicholas, the Man of Destiny, should have +descended to conducting a restaurant—and a little restaurant at +that—struck him as almost indecent.</p> + +<p class="normal">Sally, +on the other hand—for sisters always seem to fail in proper +reverence for the greatness of their brothers—was delighted.</p> + +<p class="normal">“It’s +the most splendid idea,” she said with enthusiasm. “It +really does look as if Fillmore was going to amount to something at +last. Apparently they started on quite a small scale, just making +pork-pies...”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Why +Popp?” interrupted Ginger, ventilating a question which was +perplexing him deeply.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Just +a trade name, silly. Gladys is a wonderful cook, you know, and she +made the pies and Fillmore toddled round selling them. And they did +so well that now they’ve started a regular restaurant, and +that’s a success, too. Listen to this.” Sally gurgled +again and turned over the letter. “Where is it? Oh yes! ‘... +sound financial footing. In fact, our success has been so +instantaneous that I have decided to launch out on a really big +scale. It is Big Ideas that lead to Big Business. I am +contemplating a vast extension of this venture of ours, and in a very +short time I shall organize branches in New York, Chicago, Detroit, +and all the big cities, each in charge of a manager and each offering +as a special feature, in addition to the usual restaurant cuisine, +these Popp’s Outstanding Pork-pies of ours. That done, and +having established all these branches as going concerns, I shall sail +for England and introduce Popp’s Pork-pies there...’ +Isn’t he a little wonder!”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Dashed +brainy chap. Always said so.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“I +must say I was rather uneasy when I read that. I’ve seen so +many of Fillmore’s Big Ideas. That’s always the way with +him. He gets something good and then goes and overdoes it and +bursts. However, it’s all right now that he’s got Gladys +to look after him. She has added a postscript. Just four words, but +oh! how comforting to a sister’s heart. ‘Yes, I don’t +think!’ is what she says, and I don’t know when I’ve +read anything more cheering. Thank heaven, she’s got poor dear +Fillmore well in hand.”</p> + +<p class="normal">“Pork-pies!” +said Ginger, musingly, as the pangs of a healthy hunger began to +assail his interior. “I wish he’d <i>sent</i> us one of +the outstanding little chaps. I could do with it.”</p> + +<p class="normal"> +Sally got up and ruffled his red hair.</p> + +<p class="normal">“Poor +old Ginger! I knew you’d never be able to stick it. Come on, +it’s a lovely night, lets walk to the village and revel at the +inn. We’re going to be millionaires before we know where we +are, so we can afford it.”</p> + +<p style="text-indent: 1.27cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br> +</p> + +<p style="text-indent: 1.27cm; margin-bottom: 0cm;"><br> +</p> + +<p class="center">THE END</p> + +<p><br> </p> + +<p><br> </p> + + + + + + + +<pre> +End of Project Gutenberg's The Adventures of Sally, by P. G. Wodehouse + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ADVENTURES OF SALLY *** + +This file should be named dvsll10h.htm or dvsll10h.zip +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks get a new NUMBER, dvsll11h.htm +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, dvsll10ah.htm + +Produced by Tim Barnett + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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