II
"Lend me some money, will you?" murmured Mr. Prohack lightly to hissplendid son, after he had glanced at the bill for Eve's theatre dinnerat the Grand Babylon. Mr. Prohack had indeed brought some money withhim, but not enough. "Haven't got any," said Charlie, with equallightness. "Better give me the bill. I'll see to it." Whereupon Charliesigned the bill, and handed the bowing waiter five ten shilling notes.
"That's not enough," said Mr. Prohack.
"Not enough for the tip. Well, it'll have to be. I never give more thanten per cent."
Mr. Prohack strove to conceal his own painful lack of worldliness. Hehad imagined that he had in his pockets heaps of money to pay for a mealfor a handful of people. He was mistaken; that was all, and the incidenthad no importance, for a few pounds more or less could not matter in theleast to a gentleman of his income. Yet he felt guilty of being awaster. He could not accustom himself to the scale of expenditure.Barely in the old days could he have earned in a week the price of therepast consumed now in an hour. The vast apartment was packed withpeople living at just that rate of expenditure and seeming to thinknaught of it. "But do two wrongs make a right?" he privately demanded ofhis soul. Then his soul came to the rescue with its robust commonsenseand replied:
"Perhaps two wrongs don't make a right, but five hundred wrongspositively must make a right." And he felt better.
And suddenly he understood the true function of the magnificentorchestra that dominated the scene. It was the function of a brass bandat a quack-dentist's booth in a fair,--to drown the cries of the victimsof the art of extraction.
"Yes," he reflected, full of health and carelessness. "This is a trulygreat life."
The party went off in two automobiles, his own and Lady Massulam's.Cars were fighting for room in front of the blazing facade of theMetropolitan Theatre, across which rose in fire the title of theentertainment, _Smack Your Face_, together with the names of AspreyChown and Eliza Fiddle. Car after car poured out a contingent ofglorious girls and men and was hustled off with ferocity by a row ofgigantic and implacable commissionaires. Mr. Oswald Morfey walkedstraight into the building at the head of his guests. Highly expensivepersons were humbling themselves at the little window of the box office,but Ozzie held his course, and officials performed obeisances whichstopped short only at falling flat on their faces at the sight of him.Tickets were not for him.
"This is a beautiful box," said Eve to him, amazed at the grandeur ofthe receptacle into which they had been ushered.
"It's Mr. Chown's own box."
"Then isn't Mr. Chown to be here to-night?"
"No! He went to Paris this morning for a rest. The acting manager willtelephone to him after each act. That's how he always does, you know."
"When the cat's away the mice will play," thought Mr. Prohackuncomfortably, with the naughty sensations of a mouse. The hugeauditorium was a marvellous scene of excited brilliance. As the stallsfilled up a burst of clapping came at intervals from the unseen pit.
"What are they clapping for?" said the simple Eve, who, like Mr.Prohack, had never been to a first-night before, to say nothing of sucha super-first-night as this.
"Oh!" replied Ozzie negligently. "Some one they know by sight just comeinto the stalls. The _chic_ thing in the pit is to recognise, and toshow by applause that you have recognised. The one that applauds theoftenest wins the game in the pit."
At those words and their tone Mr. Prohack looked at Ozzie with a neweye, as who should be thinking: "Is Sissie right about this fellow afterall?"
Sissie sat down modestly and calmly next to her mother. Nobody couldguess from her apparently ingenuous countenance that she knew that she,and not the Terror of the departments and his wife, was the originatingcause of Mr. Morfey's grandiose hospitality.
"I suppose the stalls are full of celebrities?" said Eve.
"They're full of people who've paid twice the ordinary price for theirseats," answered Ozzie.
"Who's that extraordinary old red-haired woman in the box opposite?"Eve demanded.
"That's Enid."
"Enid?"
"Yes. You know the Enid stove, don't you? All ladies know the Enidstove. It's been a household word for forty years. That's the originalEnid. Her father invented the stove, and named it after her when she wasa girl. She never misses a first-night."
"How extraordinary! Is she what you call a celebrity?"
"Rather!"
"Now," said Mr. Prohack. "Now, at last I understand the real meaning offame."
"But that's Charlie down there!" exclaimed Eve, suddenly, pointing tothe stalls and then looking behind her to see if there was not anotherCharlie in the box.
"Yes," Ozzie agreed. "Lady Massulam had an extra stall, and as five's abit of a crowd in this box.... I thought he'd told you."
"He had not," said Eve.
The curtain went up, and this simple gesture on the part of the curtainevoked enormous applause. The audience could not control the expressionof its delight. A young lady under a sunshade appeared; the mere fact ofher existence threw the audience into a new ecstasy. An old man with ared nose appeared: similar demonstrations from the audience. When thesetwo had talked to each other and sung to each other, the applause wastripled, and when the scene changed from Piccadilly Circus at 4 a.m. tothe interior of a Spanish palace inhabited by illustrious French actorsand actresses who proceeded to play an act of a tragedy by Corneille,the applause was quintupled. At the end of the tragedy the applause wasdecupled. Then the Spanish palace dissolved into an Abyssinian harem,and Eliza Fiddle in Abyssinian costume was discovered lying upon twothousand cushions of two thousand colours, and the audience rose atEliza and Eliza rose at the audience, and the resulting frenzy was thesublimest frenzy that ever shook a theatre. The piece was stopped deadfor three minutes while the audience and Eliza protested a mutual andunique passion. From this point onwards Mr. Prohack lost his head. Heran to and fro in the bewildering glittering maze of the piece, seekingfor an explanation, for a sign-post, for a clue, for the slightest hint,and found nothing. He had no alternative but to cling to Eliza Fiddle,and he clung to her desperately. She was willing to be clung to. Shegave herself, not only to Mr. Prohack, but to every member of theaudience separately; she gave herself in the completeness of all hermanifestations. The audience was rich in the possession of the whole ofher individuality, which was a great deal. She sang, danced, chattered,froze, melted, laughed, cried, flirted, kissed, kicked, cursed, andturned somersaults with the fury of a dervish, the languor of anodalisque, and the inexhaustibility of a hot-spring geyser.... And atlength Mr. Prohack grew aware of a feeling within himself that was atwar with the fresh, fine feeling of physical well-being. "I have neverseen a revue before," he said in secret. "Is it possible that I ambored?"