It was not till the following Friday that Sally was able to start forDetroit. She arrived on the Saturday morning and drove to the HotelStatler. Having ascertained that Gerald was stopping in the hotel andhaving 'phoned up to his room to tell him to join her, she went into thedining-room and ordered breakfast.
She felt low-spirited as she waited for the food to arrive. The nursingof Mr. Faucitt had left her tired, and she had not slept well on thetrain. But the real cause of her depression was the fact that there hadbeen a lack of enthusiasm in Gerald's greeting over the telephone justnow. He had spoken listlessly, as though the fact of her returningafter all these weeks was a matter of no account, and she felt hurt andperplexed.
A cup of coffee had a stimulating effect. Men, of course, were alwayslike this in the early morning. It would, no doubt, be a very differentGerald who would presently bound into the dining-room, quickened andrestored by a cold shower-bath. In the meantime, here was food, and sheneeded 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 thehotel lobby which was visible through the open door of the dining-room,came in and stood peering about as though in search of someone. Themomentary sight she had had of this young man had interested Sally. Shehad thought how extraordinarily like he was to her brother Fillmore. Nowshe perceived that it was Fillmore himself.
Sally was puzzled. What could Fillmore be doing so far west? She hadsupposed 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 inthe doorway looking in every direction except the right one for anotherminute, he saw her and came over to her table.
"Why, Sally?" His manner, she thought, was nervous--one might almosthave said embarrassed. She attributed this to a guilty conscience.Presently he would have to break to her the news that he had becomeengaged to be married without her sisterly sanction, and no doubt he waswondering how to begin. "What are you doing here? I thought you were inEurope."
"I got back a week ago, but I've been nursing poor old Mr. Faucitt eversince 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 lastMonday."
"No, it didn't. Haven't you heard? They've closed all the theatresbecause of this infernal Spanish influenza. Nothing has been playingthis 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 thedarndest 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 theshow. Cracknell--you remember he was at college with me--suggested thatI should come down and look at it. Shouldn't wonder if he wants me toput 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 goodthing."
"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 herweight about all the time. The other day there was a fuss about apaper-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 myfault..."
"How could it have been your fault?" asked Sally wonderingly. Loveseemed to have the worst effects on Fillmore's mentality.
"Well--er--you know how it is. Angry woman... blames the first personshe 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 facebrightened and animation crept into his voice. "But the girl you want towatch is Miss Winch. Gladys Winch. She plays the maid. She's only inthe first act, and hasn't much to say, except 'Did you ring, madam?' andthings like that. But it's the way she says 'em! Sally, that girl's agenius! The greatest character actress in a dozen years! You mark mywords, in a darned little while you'll see her name up on Broadway inelectric light. Personality? Ask me! Charm? She wrote the words andmusic! Looks?..."
"All right! All right! I know all about it, Fill. And will you kindlyinform 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 MissWinch, 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 mightbe in here."
"Who's Bunbury?"
"The producer. I suppose he is breakfasting in his room. I'd better goup."
"You are busy, aren't you. Little marvel! It's lucky they've got you tolook after them."
Fillmore retired and Sally settled down to wait for Gerald, no longerhurt by his manner over the telephone. Poor Gerald! No wonder he hadseemed 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 voiceover the telephone. A sort of nervous dullness wrapped him about like agarment.
"It's just my luck," he said gloomily. "It's the kind of thing thatcouldn't happen to anyone but me. Damned fools! Where's the sense inshutting the theatres, even if there is influenza about? They let peoplejam against one another all day in the stores. If that doesn't hurt themwhy should it hurt them to go to theatres? Besides, it's all infernalnonsense about this thing. I don't believe there is such a thing asSpanish influenza. People get colds in their heads and think they'redying. It's all a fake scare."
"I don't think it's that," said Sally. "Poor Mr. Faucitt had it quitebadly. That's why I couldn't come earlier."
Gerald did not seem interested either by the news of Mr. Faucitt'sillness or by the fact that Sally, after delay, had at last arrived. Hedug a spoon sombrely into his grape-fruit.
"We've been hanging about here day after day, getting bored to deathall the time... The company's going all to pieces. They're sick ofrehearsing and rehearsing when nobody knows if we'll ever open. Theywere all keyed up a week ago, and they've been sagging ever since. Itwill ruin the play, of course. My first chance! Just chucked away."
Sally was listening with a growing feeling of desolation. She tried tobe fair, to remember that he had had a terrible disappointment and wasunder a great strain. And yet... it was unfortunate that self-pity was athing she particularly disliked in a man. Her vanity, too, was hurt. Itwas obvious that her arrival, so far from acting as a magic restorative,had effected nothing. She could not help remembering, though it madeher feel disloyal, what Mr. Faucitt had said about Gerald. She had nevernoticed before that he was remarkably self-centred, but he was thrustingthe 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 neverto have had the part, never. She can't handle it. Elsa Doland could playit a tho
usand 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 astar is till you've seen one of these promoted clothes-props from theFollies trying to be one. It took me an hour to talk her round and keepher from throwing up her part."
"Why not let her throw up her part?"
"For heaven's sake talk sense," said Gerald querulously. "Do you supposethat man Cracknell would keep the play on if she wasn't in it? He wouldclose the show in a second, and where would I be then? You don't seemto realize that this is a big chance for me. I'd look a fool throwing itaway."
"I see," said Sally, shortly. She had never felt so wretched in herlife. Foreign travel, she decided, was a mistake. It might be pleasantand broadening to the mind, but it seemed to put you so out of touchwith people when you got back. She analysed her sensations, and arrivedat the conclusion that what she was resenting was the fact that Geraldwas trying to get the advantages of two attitudes simultaneously. A manin 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 hercommiseration, and at the same time raising a barrier against it. Heappeared to demand her sympathy while holding himself aloof from it. Shehad the uncomfortable sensation of feeling herself shut out and useless.
"By the way," said Gerald, "there's one thing. I have to keep herjollying along all the time, so for goodness' sake don't go letting itout 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 oneof those swift changes which sometimes made her feel that she must belacking in character. A simple, comforting thought had come to her,altering her entire outlook. She had come off the train tired andgritty, and what seemed the general out-of-jointness of the world wasentirely due, she decided, to the fact that she had not had a bath andthat her hair was all anyhow. She felt suddenly tranquil. If it wasmerely her grubby and dishevelled condition that made Gerald seem to herso different, all was well. She put her hand on his with a quick gestureof 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 meif I had enjoyed myself in Europe?"
"Did you enjoy yourself?"
"Yes, except that I missed you so much. There! Now we can consider mylecture on foreign travel finished, and you can go on telling me yourtroubles."
Gerald accepted the invitation. He spoke at considerable length, thoughwith little variety. It appeared definitely established in his mind thatProvidence had invented Spanish influenza purely with a view to wreckinghis future. But now he seemed less aloof, more open to sympathy.The brief thunderstorm had cleared the air. Sally lost that sense ofdetachment and exclusion which had weighed upon her.
"Well," said Gerald, at length, looking at his watch, "I suppose I hadbetter be off."
"Rehearsal?"
"Yes, confound it. It's the only way of getting through the day. Are youcoming 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.
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