The Man Who Understood Women and Other Stories/The Call from the Past
THE CALL FROM THE PAST
Once there was a prosperous solicitor, and he had two sons. The elder he took into his office; the younger he sent to the Bar. The younger boy's name was Robert, and he was generally called "Bob." The elder boy's name was Edward, and no one ever called him "Ted."
Edward went to the office with satisfaction. He was a shrewd youth who made useful friends, and didn't allow pleasure to stand in the way of profit. Before he had been in the business two years he bullied the head clerk, and it was predicted that he would "go further than his father." Bob entered his profession negligently. He was a genial fellow who liked bohemian clubs, and wrote farces that were never produced. Before he had been at the Bar two years he succumbed to an unconquerable passion and went on the stage.
The stage had not then become the smartest vocation in England. Viscounts occasionally married dancing-girls, but socially that was as high as the theatre had climbed. It may be difficult for English people of to-day to credit it, but though old Mr. Blackstone was simply a solicitor, he felt humiliated when his son "took to play-acting." What will be understood more easily, is that he was wrathful in thinking of the money he had wasted to make a barrister of a crank. He told the crank that he washed his hands of him, and as a matter of fact talked rather like the irate parents in the comedies in which Bob was going to perform.
Nevertheless his growl was worse than his bite—in which he resembled the comedy parents again. Ascertaining that Bob's salary was to be fifteen shillings a week, and that the histrionic career was precarious, he undertook to make an annual contribution of forty pounds, payable quarterly, for the term of three years. "At the end of which time," he said, "I think you ought to be able to support yourself, if you have really any aptitude as a buffoon."
Barring the "buffoon," Bob was of the same opinion. Don't laugh at him, he was young. He slammed the door of his chambers rejoicing, and—because his father wished him to change his name—he dropped the "Blackstone" and called himself "Lawless." The old man remarked that "Senseless" would be better still, but Bob thought not.
Now if this had been a nice, edifying story, with a Moral presented gratis to every purchaser. Bob would have had only two courses open to him. He would either have succeeded brilliantly and moved his father to tears of pride, or he would have found the discomforts unbearable and returned repentant. In reality he didn't succeed at all, and he had never been so happy in his life.
His sole regret was that the tour was short, for when it finished he was out of an engagement. He remained out of an engagement much longer than he had been in one, and subsisted on the parental allowance. The change from the fleshpots of Regent's Park was severe, and if anything could have cooled his stage fever, it would have been cooled now, but it defied even semi-starvation. By-and-by he obtained another small part, and his temperature was higher still. Confidently he assured himself that by the time the allowance was withdrawn he would be independent of it. And that was where he erred. At the end of the three years he was pacing the Strand. He had had hard luck, and old Mr. Blackstone was hard too. He stuck to his guns; Bob must shift by his own abilities henceforward, or Bob must go back to the Bar. Bob was footsore, hungry and penniless; Bob went back to the Bar.
Of course there was still his pen. His hopes as an actor had been shivered, but to his ambitions as a dramatist he clung. His pen was the spar in the shipwreck. The night was black, but afar the footlights beamed. Buffeted as he was, he might regain them by his pen.
So he wrote more farces—farces and burlesques, and one or two melodramas as well. His father did not know that. Robert Blackstone, the budding barrister, preserved appearances; and Robert Lawless, the panting playwright, preserved his manuscripts—for they all came back. All, that is to say, with the exception of a farcical comedy which he had actually sold for twenty-five pounds but which had never been staged. Some of his work was good, but in England the chief qualifications for artistic success are commercial ability, and the money to exploit it; Bob lacked both. By degrees he became weary of trying to reach the limelit shore, his struggles grew fainter; by degrees "Robert Lawless" took some interest in Robert Blackstone. He thought of the Bar more, and of the Theatre less. One day when his father told him he had "handled the brief uncommonly well," he was elated. He was nine and-twenty now.
Robert Blackstone had begun to cut "Robert Lawless" out—was travelling faster, proving the better of the pair. And "Lawless," who felt rather sore about it at first, presently forgave him. Bob began to look less like a Bob and more like a Robert. People noticed "what a strong resemblance there was between him and his brother." As an earnest young barrister he no longer frequented bohemian clubs. It was understood that one mustn't go round to Plowden Buildings any more and waste his time. Nobody said to him now, "Come and have a drink, old chap!" Occasionally someone might say, "Will you—er—take a glass of sherry, Mr. Blackstone?"
As the years passed, even that was seldom said. He had shaken off the dust of Plowden Buildings, and had chambers in Garden Court. His humour was becoming heavy. The mothers of marriageable daughters found it convulsing. He was spoken of as a man with a future, and dined at dreary houses. Old Blackstone died, and as Robert was making a handsome income he was mentioned in the will with abundant generosity. Wherefore he was rich. So was Edward the solicitor, who had a wife and three children now. Edward was proud of his brother; he wanted him to take silk, and to stand for Beckenhampton later. Robert was thinking of these things himself. His age was forty-one. And here ends the prologue.
So we see that this unedifying story may be said to begin at a point long after all orthodox stories have concluded—it really begins twelve years after the prodigal reformed. Reformation, we know, is always final—in stories. When the prodigal has once returned to the odour of sanctity we are quite sure that he will never desire change of air; we understand that he will always be just as good and peaceful as we leave him on the last page. Human nature is made like that—in stories.
One May afternoon, as Robert came out of court, a man murmured to another, "He's a dry stick, is Blackstone!" and Robert overheard, and smiled his dry smile. Yes, he supposed that was his social reputation at the Bar. As he joined Edward, and listened to his pleased comments on the Jury's finding, he even admitted to himself that the reputation might be deserved. Odd! how very different from a "dry stick" he had been once.
Edward was animated—for Edward. He kept nodding his grey head, and pinched his nose repeatedly between his forefinger and thumb, a habit that he had in conversation. They stood talking in the street for about ten minutes. It occurred to Robert with a touch of faint surprise that he had long ceased to shirk his brother's company; yet there was no doubt that Edward was quite as dull a dog as he had ever been. As they talked there, outside the Law Courts, Robert compassionated himself a little for not being bored by Edward.
He had been cheerful as he unrobed, but the remark he had caught lurked in his ears, and when he entered his chambers he found himself repeating it. "For the defendant," a pleasant phrase to-day, was momentarily forgotten; "a dry stick" sounded in his mind instead. He, "Bob," had actually become a "dry stick"!
And he was only forty-one. He lit a cigarette and mused. Beyond the open window the flowers of the garden were bright in sunshine, and the fountain tinkled dreamily. There was a nurse-maid with a child among the flowers; he wondered, for a moment, whether he would have done well to marry.
Marvellous, in looking back, how suddenly success had come!—marvellous to remember how hard he had had to flog his brain at the beginning to earn a legal guinea; if one managed to turn the second corner at the Bar at all, one sped on with a rush. But how unlikely it had looked that he would ever turn that corner!
How unlikely it had looked in the days when he belonged to the Amity Club and fellows used to quote his jokes he flashed over a tankard and a steak at three in the morning! If his boyish hopes had been justified, if he had had talent as an actor, perhaps life would have tasted better to him, after all? "Robert Blackstone, K.C." He would soon be that. "Robert Blackstone, K.C., M.P."? He might expect it. "Sir Robert Blackstone, Solicitor-General"? It was on the cards. Why wouldn't his heart swell at the prospect, why didn't he catch his breath, what the deuce had become of all his emotions?
Oh! he was getting sentimental, listening to the fountain. Shut the window, ring the bell, see what briefs had come in!
"And a letter, sir."
"All right," said Robert, "put it down."
The eagerness with which he used once to seize his briefs—the swift glance to learn the fee, the impatience to gather the contents! Other incomes, other manners—he pulled the tape off leisurely to-day. "‘A dry stick'!" he reiterated. Oh, one had to pay for success, there was no doubt.
His gaze wandered to the letter, and rested on it, startled; a little quiver ran through him. For several seconds a sensation that was half pleasure, half pain, held him quite still. The letter had been redirected from Plowden Buildings. It was addressed to "Robert Lawless, Esq.,"—c|o himself!
"T. R., Hetton-Le-Hole,
Durham, May 1st.
"Dear Sir,—I have come across the scrip of your farcical comedy entitled No Flies on Flossie all rights of which I acquired some years ago. It is a bit antique in parts now, and I think you might like to bring it up to date. I am putting it on at O.H. Ashton-under-Lyne to see how it shapes. We rehearse at P.O.W. Manchester. The first Call is for twelve o'clock, Monday, 18th inst.—Yours faithfully,
"Cavendish Pink."
When the colour had crept back to his face, Robert laughed—the perfunctory laugh that he gave to a Judge's joke. He shrugged his shoulders. He put the letter down, and laughed again—he was acting to himself unconsciously. After a minute or two he picked it up and re-read it. How had Cavendish Pink come by the play? "Acquired" it? Not from the author. But the adventures of the manuscript were unimportant. Pink? Pink had been a rather popular comedian. On the see-saw of life Mr. Pink had gone down while Mr. Blackstone went up.
For the third time he read the letter. He knew that "T.R." stood for "Theatre Royal," but the other abbreviations had mystified him. It recurred to him with emotion that "O.H." meant "Opera House," and that "P.O.W." meant "Prince of Wales's." That he could have forgotten these things even for a moment! He drummed his fingers on the briefs, and saw his Youth.
Of course he could have nothing to do with the matter. "No Flies on Flossie—the work, we understand, of Mr. Robert Blackstone, the well-known barrister," etc. He shuddered in imagining such a paragraph. He said that it was lucky "Robert Lawless" was forgotten; certainly "Robert Lawless" would reveal nothing to anyone who saw the piece at Ashton-under-Lyne, and doubtless its "run" would begin and end there. If he were silent, nobody would suspect his connection with it. But—well, if this had happened a few years earlier, he would have gone down to the place, just for a day, to see the performance. He said he would have felt curious about it—a few years ago!
Three or four hours had passed before he confessed to himself that he was curious now. He was in his library after dinner; and though he had no intention of humouring his curiosity, he humoured his mind. It dwelt on scenes in the farce that had appeared to him brilliant when he wrote them. Would they appear brilliant to-day? He remembered the evening when he scribbled "Curtain," and Dick turned up and heard the last act read. "Jove! I didn't think you had it in you," Dick had said; he was sitting on the window-sill—how it all came back!—how time flew! The score of hopes and disappointments the work had brought; with what passion he had despaired at that age! Could he despair so passionately at this? And then the excitement when the thing was taken—what a whirlwind of exultance! That night that he got the news. He had dragged Dick out for oysters just before Scott's closed, and afterwards they had sat up talking till daylight. The piece was to be produced a few weeks hence, and Dick had stipulated for two stalls on the first night, to take his girl. … Thirteen years ago! And Dick was dead.
On the morrow Robert decided that he might, after all, run down to Ashton-under-Lyne. He said he would not enter the stage-door, no one should surmise that the author was present; he would simply take a seat in the dress circle like anybody else. Why not? To associate himself with No Flies on Flossie was impossible, but to resist the desire to peep at it would be motiveless. No doubt when he was in the theatre he'd be hotly ashamed of having perpetrated such trash. Still
He made no reply to Cavendish Pink. He was not prepared to revert to comic dialogue, even under a pseudonym, nor did he see his way to correspond on the subject. Probably it would be inferred that the letter had gone astray, or that Mr. Lawless had died. Well, he was dead. Yet Robert Blackstone owned to himself that he regretted being unable to attend Bob Lawless's rehearsals. He did not own it all at once, he regretted it for some time before he owned it. Then he said again that if this had happened a few years earlier, he might have—Eh? Just for a day or two? Yes, he would have given himself the fun then! It wouldn't have mattered so much a few years earlier.
How ardently, in the period when he was a small-part actor, he had looked forward to striding about a stage as the author and telling the company what to do! He had never rehearsed in a West End theatre, or he would have known that authors are rather small fry after the plays are written. It had been his dream. The author! And of course he would be privileged to smoke—he had imagined himself with a cigar between his lips, and his hands in the pockets of a fur overcoat. In his dream it was generally winter, because he wanted to wear a fur overcoat. Nice girls waylaid him in the wings, and said, "Do write in a line for me to speak, Mr. Lawless, please!" And he did. The courtly consideration that he had always shown—in his dream—to the humblest members of the cast! The glowing terms in which everyone had spoken of him—in his dream! … It would have been agreeable to go to Manchester for the rehearsals.
About a week later he said that of course he wouldn't be so stupid, but that as a matter of fact he could go if he chose; he could go as "Mr. Lawless"! It was in the highest degree unlikely that anyone in a third-rate provincial company would know his face. He wouldn't do it, because he had long ago left such follies behind, but there was really nothing else to prevent him.
"The first Call is for twelve o'clock, Monday, 18th instant." Constantly the man thought of it, sometimes he fingered the letter again; daily, in the drawer of his desk, under the documents, under the briefs, it tempted him—the Call from the past.
Oh, out of the question!
He supposed it would be a folly?
After all, should he go?
If the Easter Term did not end on the 16th of May, there would have been no story; but it does.
He felt strange to himself when he took his ticket on Sunday. He felt excited, nervous, guilty. On the platform he avoided a man whom he knew. He realised the sensations of a fugitive from justice, and threw an apprehensive glance about the restaurant car. What should he say if he were asked where he was going? He was sorry the rehearsals were to be held in a big city like Manchester; what more likely than that an acquaintance would run against him in the street? As to the hotel, it would brim with danger: at any moment someone might exclaim, "How d'ye do?—what has brought you here?" But, to be sure, he merely meant to remain in an hotel for the night—on the morrow he would go into lodgings. They would be extremely uncomfortable, but at all events they would be private, and it was only for a week, after all. A week would soon pass. He found himself wishing that it had passed already.
Rain was falling when he arrived at Manchester. He spent a melancholy evening in the "smoke-room." Presently he saw a theatrical paper, and turning it over, observed advertisements of "professional apatrments"; several of the advertised houses were in Manchester. The idea of installing himself in theatrical lodgings again carried a little tremor with it; but it was not unpleasant. These addresses to his hand, moreover, would spare him trouble.
Rain was falling when he shaved. No matter—it would be well to make his arrangements before he went to the rehearsal! He breakfasted briskly, opposite a commercial traveller who performed extraordinary feats with a knife and fork. At ten o'clock he had his bag put on to a cab. "All Saints," he said, for in Manchester all theatrical landladies and All Saints are neighbours.
The side streets of All Saints were not prepossessing. As he rang the first bell, he glanced about him wonderingly. Had he really been happy in places like this when he was young? He was relieved when the slatternly householder answered that she had only a "combined room." He interviewed several householders without success.
Gradually the manner in which he made his applications lost something of its legal stiffness; he laboured for a touch of the old-time freedom which he knew was demanded by the situation. He rang another bell, and a young woman in curling-pins came to the door.
"What rooms have you got this week?" asked Robert, uneasily familiar.
"What do you want?" said the woman.
"I want a sitting-room and bedroom," he said. And she was able to accommodate him.
Against the piano was a pile of comic songs; on the mantelpiece there were likenesses of performers in tights. The rooms were cosily furnished, and the rent was ten shillings a week inclusive of gas and fires; the Manchester weather was still chilly.
"I'll take them," said Robert.
When he had unpacked his bag, he smoked a cigar in the parlour, and smiled. "One always returns to one's first love," he mused; and really the first love looked attractive, though he viewed the signboard of a "mechanical chimney-sweep" through the window.
Presently he asked his landlady for her card,
"I'll have to give you my professional card," she said, "but it has got the address on it; I'm in the profession myself."
He read, "Mdlle. Superba: Terpsichorean Gymnast."
"That's me," she said, pointing, "that portrait there. I only let rooms as a 'obby—I don't let regular all the year round. Think it's good?"
"It doesn't flatter you," said Robert. But she was captivating in her gymnast's costume; he would never have supposed the photograph was meant for her. "I'm fortunate to find you 'letting' this week."
"Well, it's like this, it gives me something to do when I'm at home. That's what my husband says; he says, 'It gives you something to do.' And I don't take ladies, they're a bit too much—'Can we 'ave some 'ot water, Ma?' all hours of the day; 'Can I come and 'eat my curling-tongs in the kitchen fire, Ma?' Ladies are a handful, and, as I say, I only let as a 'obby. I'm going on tour again in August. Perhaps you've seen me in the Halls?"
"I've often applauded you in the Halls," he said, courteously untruthful; "I was puzzled why your face was so familiar to me." He was conscious that he hadn't recovered the note yet, he knew that he was being much too formal. Could he pluck up the spirit to call a landlady "Ma" again himself?
There was an unaccustomed exhilaration in his veins as he drove to the Prince of Wales's; he did not define the feeling, but what he felt was "younger." When the cab jerked to a stoppage, his pulses beat like a lover's. He leapt out, and saw "Stage Entrance" painted on a dirty door. Again he pulled a stage-door open. "What name?" he was asked; "Mr. Lawless," he answered. And all at once he did not know if he was happy or ashamed; but he knew that he trembled.
The theatre looked dark for the first minute. He received a dim impression of ill-dressed people, drew a breathful of mouldy atmosphere that swept him back into the past. A vociferous man shook hands with him, and called him "my boy." "So you've turned up, my boy! That's all right. Afraid you hadn't had my note."
"How do you do, Mr. Pink," responded Robert.
They sat down in the stalls swathed in holland wrappers, and the mist before him melted. The ill-dressed people acquired features; he realised that the rehearsal had begun, and that the figures on the stage were the butler and the maid-servant reading the opening scene of his farce.
"It wants freshening up, Lawless," said Mr. Pink; "it's a bit Noah's Arky here and there—old-fashioned. Still I think there's stuff in it. I'd like you to keep your ears open, see where you can stick in some lines. Make it modern, my boy, make it a bit topical; you know what I mean?"
"Oh—er—of course," said Robert with dismay. "Yes, certainly I must see what I can do."
He was painfully embarrassed; he had not felt so nervous since the day he heard himself pleading in court for the first time. When the vociferous man left him, he thanked Heaven. Vaguely he thought of making his escape, of sending a telegram to say he was recalled to town.
"Mr. Lawless?"
A pale, shabby girl had come to him. She had very beautiful grey eyes; he was surprised that he had overlooked her.
"Yes?" he said.
"I'm to play 'Flossie'—I wanted to ask you a question about her. Is she simple in the first act, or only putting it on?"
He had no longer any views on the subject, but it would never do to say so.
"Simple," he said. "Oh, decidedly simple in the first act."
"That's what I thought!" she nodded, "and Mr. Pink wants me to do it the other way—Mr. Pink says she is only putting it on."
He perceived that he had encouraged her to defy the management.
"Of course," he added hastily, "when I say 'simple,' I mean relatively simple—everything is relative."
"Oh, y-e-s," she said. But she was evidently at sea. After a moment she went on, "What I really want to know is how she is to speak those lines sitting on the hamper—is she sincere in that speech or isn't she?"
"That, of course, is the question," murmured Robert. "Yes, precisely. That speech is the—the"
"It's the keynote to the part," she said. He wished distressfully he could remember what speech she meant. Perhaps, after all, he had better be frank!
"To be quite honest with you," he said, "I wrote the piece a good many years ago; and since then I"
"Oh, I see!" she laughed. "How funny! Since then you've written so many others that you've forgotten what it's about?"
"Exactly," said Robert; "that is to say, not at all. I haven't written any others, but I have forgotten what it's about."
They regarded each other silently for a moment. … She seemed a singularly nice girl.
"I was quite a young man when I wrote it," he said abruptly.
"And you've done nothing since?"
"Well—er—not in the dramatic line. You're rehearsing my last attempt."
"Oh, I do hope it'll be a success!" she said earnestly, "then you'll go on working. It must be rather—rather queer to see us rehearsing a piece you wrote so long ago?"
"It is," said Robert, "very queer." He paused again—he was again abrupt: "Once I knew every line of the three acts by heart."
She lifted her eyes to him gravely, and didn't speak for a second. He liked her for not speaking—he saw that she understood.
"How it must take you back!" she whispered.
He sighed—and smiled. "So, you see, Mr. Pink probably knows more about your part to-day than the author does.—Er—you needn't tell all the company what I've said."
"As if I should!" she exclaimed. "Oh! there's my cue, I must fly!"
"Miss Wilson!" shouted Pink. "Come on, Miss Wilson, please—take up your cues!"
"My fault," called Robert, "I'm to blame."
She looked back over her shoulder, smiling at him as she ran, and somehow the rehearsal was more interesting to Robert. The nice girl read the lines he had invented thirteen years before—and listening to her, he remembered.
Rain was falling when the rehearsal finished. She hadn't an umbrella. "Which way do you go?" he asked as the stage-door slammed.
"All Saints," she replied; "Rumford Street."
"That's my way, too. I want a cab—I can give you a lift."
"A cab?" She was openly astonished. "If you must squander money, you can take a penny car. But why not walk?"
"Is that what you do in the wet?"
"Well, if I took a cab every time it was wet in Manchester, my salary wouldn't go far, would it?"
"I have no idea what your salary is."
"Three pounds," she said frankly. "It isn't much for a leading lady, eh?"
"It isn't much for a leading lady, but it's a good deal for a young girl. In any other business three pounds a week wants a lot of earning."
"Oh, I know," she said. "I've got young brothers in the city. They call me 'the millionaire of the family.’"
"Do they like your being on tour alone?"
"Well, you see, it was necessary for me to earn my own living; things weren't very bright at home when I grew up. I don't spend all my salary on the delicacies of the season—I send half to my mother every week. I couldn't be any help to her if I were in a clerkship like the boys.
"But you're fond of the stage, aren't you? You sounded enthusiastic when you floored me with those questions."
She shrugged her shoulders. "At the beginning I was in love with it; I've been in the profession eight years now. You're giving me all your unbrella."
"There's no expense attached to that," said Robert.
The cars were full, and she was evidently averse from a cab; so they went along Oxford Street afoot, keeping close together.
"I suppose you'll go and see a show to-night?" she inquired.
"I hadn't thought of it," he said. "Shall you?"
"There's nothing else to do when one isn't playing. It's ghastly sitting in diggings all the evening, isn't it?"
"It must be dull if you're alone," he assented. It occurred to him that his own evening was going to be very dull indeed.
"Oh, I'm not alone, I'm with the girl who plays 'Aunt Rachel'; but it's dull anyhow. We thought of asking for seats at the St. James's."
"I—I think',' said Robert, "that I'll go, too. Perhaps I shall see you there. Or we might all go together, mightn't we?"
"Why, yes," she replied, "it would be very nice. Let's!"
"It would be delightful I" said Robert "Yes, let's!"
They had reached her door, and she asked him if he would go in and have some tea. He said he would. They found the other girl at home, toasting crumpets. Miss Wilson toasted crumpets. Robert toasted crumpets also. They all knelt on the hearthrug and toasted crumpets together. His hostesses cried that they were "rising in their profession, having the author to tea!" He laughed. He cracked a joke. He wondered what Edward would say if he could see him.
At the St. James's the girls obtained two stalls for nothing, and Robert insisted on paying for one, though Miss Wilson reproved him for such waste of money. "We could quite easily have asked for three," she said. "It is silly of you! You make me angry."
Greatly daring, he proposed supper when the performance was over. The restaurants of Manchester were far to seek, but he didn't know that; he even told himself that it mattered nothing if he were recognised; the girls were ladies, a man had a right to take his friends to supper! However, they wouldn't go; that is to say, Miss Wilson wouldn't go; the other girl looked as if she wanted to. Miss Wilson said he must wait to see if his piece was a success. "If it makes a hit, well—perhaps!" He understood that she took it for granted he was poor—she wouldn't let him be extravagant: the situation was not without a charm.
They chattered gaily as far as her apartments. "I can't ask you in after the show," she murmured.
"No, I know," he said—"I remember!" As he strolled on, he reflected that the day had been remarkably agreeable. He made for his lodging in high good humour. In Oxford Street he started, he received a shock, almost he staggered—he had perceived that he was whistling!
The terpsichorean gymnast gave him eggs boiled to perfection in the morning, and much better coffee than he got at home. As he tapped the second shell, it occurred to Robert that he had not opened a newspaper yesterday. Extraordinary! How often he had winced in recollecting that he never looked at a newspaper when he was a provincial actor! And actually he had been as bad again. He bought The Manchester Guardian, and other papers after breakfast—and kept glancing at the clock.
It was rather jolly to sally forth to rehearsal, though when it was time to go, rain was falling. He entered the theatre with zest to-day. Even he resented less stiffly the vociferous man's calling him "my boy." Miss Wilson's pale face smiled at him as at a friend. He conversed with one or two other members of the company, and saw his way to inserting a topical allusion in the dialogue. Pink pronounced it "devilish good." Robert the Reviving was gratified that Pink thought his line "devilish good." When he was asked vociferously if he would "come across and have a drink," he didn't say "no." They drank prosperity to the piece in a vulgar bar. And he took back a box of sandwiches, and Peggy Wilson, and "Aunt Rachel," and he shared them in the stalls.
Almost the next thing that Robert realised vividly was that it was Friday. Rain was falling. It amazed him how the interval had flown. "Aunt Rachel" had gone over to Bury, where her fiancé was playing at the Royal, and Miss Wilson, left alone, was coming in to tea. Robert had ordered cream with the tea, and simnel cake. He stood at the window eager-eyed; the sign-board of the "mechanical chimney-sweep" did not obtrude itself to him. He remembered how long it was since he last watched for a girl to come to tea.
But when she turned the comer he remembered only that he was to have a gracious afternoon. He wheeled the armchair to the hearth for her, and brought her a footstool. She was less talkative than usual. Somehow the first few minutes were disappointing.
"I have to go on Tuesday," he marked presently; "and then it'll be all over."
"But you're coming to Ashton-under-Lyne for the production?"
"I don't know; I don't know that I shall be able to. I wish I hadn't to go back—I haven't enjoyed anything so much for years. By the way, I want you to do me a favour—I want you girls to come to supper with me on Monday night. I thought we might go and see a show"—he didn't notice that he was saying "show" again, instead of "theatre"—"and have a little supper here afterwards. I'd suggest a restaurant, but there'd be no time to eat anything before we were turned out."
"What would your landlady say?"
"I've sounded her. I said, 'I suppose you wouldn't think there was any harm in my bringing two ladies in to supper after the show one evening?' 'Certainly not, Mr. Lawless,' she said. 'Would you like it hot?' That's a landlady that is a landlady. Will you?"
"We'll see about it," said Miss Wilson.
"You might say 'yes,’" he begged. "Give me a happy memory for the end."
"But it won't be the end; we shall often see you, shan't we, if the piece runs?"
"Perhaps it won't run. And even if it does—I'm a busy man."
"Too busy to think of your pals? What do you do?"
"Are we pals?" he questioned. "I'm yours; but are you mine? Really? You've known me such a very little while."
"No longer than you've known me."
"It's not the same thing, though. You meet lots of men; I don't meet lots of girls. To me this week has been quite out of the common; to you it's only one of the fifty-two."
"What do you do in London?" she inquired again. "What are you?"
"A dry stick," said Robert.
"Well, you aren't a dry stick in Manchester!" she said.
It was not a brilliant reply, but she couldn't have made one that would have pleased him more.
Yet the tea was a failure. She never ate cake, she told him; somehow she didn't care for tea either this afternoon—she sipped about a quarter of a cupful. He had scarcely stirred his own when she was declaring she must go: "You won't think it rude of me if I run away now?" He gave her her muff blankly. A creature of moods, as changeful as an April day! But when she was sunny, how sunny! The table looked pathetic to him when she had gone. He stood at the window, downcast; the signboard of the chimney-sweep darkened the road.
Mademoiselle Superba put the simnel cake on the top of the piano, because there wasn't a sideboard, and it stood there uncovered till it was dusty. Then the night of the supper arrived, and there were a galantine, and prawns in aspic, and a mayonnaise; and the first thing the creature of moods did when she came in was to pounce on the dusty cake and devour a slice before she took her hat off.
"Peggy!" exclaimed the other girl reprovingly.
"I may?" she cried, flashing a glance at Robert. Yes, she knew she might! She knew she might do anything she chose there. "I'm going to have more light!" she said, and lit another burner of the gaselier.
Mademoiselle Superba—majestic in black silk, with pendent pearls in her ears, and her hair dressed like Truefitt's window—looked in for a moment to ask if all was well. Robert thanked her for doing it so extremely well. Peggy said sweetly, "I hear you're in the profession too?" The woman was pleased at that. So was Robert—it was nice of Peggy. Because there was no sideboard, cutlery and plates were set forth on the piano; because there were no champagne glasses, they drank the champagne out of tumblers.
"Didn't I forbid you to be extravagant?" cried Peggy.
He liked "forbid." "Forgive me!" he smiled.
"This once," she laughed. "But you must be very economical in London."
"I shall have no parties like it in London, I assure you."
"Nor I!" said she.
"Do you live in London?"
She threw him a nod. "Crouch End."
"Tell me more," he urged. "And let me give you both some salad."
"More? Well, once we had a servant. Now we haven't. I do housework when I'm at home—I blacklead the grates. That's why my hands aren't pretty."
"Don't," he said, pained. Her hands weren't pretty, but he revered them now he knew the reason.
"Peggy!" said the other girl, dismayed. The other girl was obsessed by "manners" when she was out.
"I'm frightfully untidy in the morning. In novels the poor heroine always has on 'snowy cuffs and collars' with her rags. Pickles! In real life the poor heroine has to think of the laundry bills. Oh, you'd be shocked at me in the morning! After the boys have gone, I turn a room out sometimes—my skirt pinned up, and a duster over my head. Can you see me? Mother's not very strong—the cooking's business enough for mother. Then I go up to the agents' and try to get something to do. In a very smart costume! with a picture hat—I made it!—and white gloves. Oh, you'd be impressed by Peggy in the afternoon; you wouldn't recognise me in the Strand. You're not seeing my best clothes here, don't think it—I'm in an engagement, I'm stopping the expenses!"
"Peggy!" groaned the other girl again. He divined a kick under the table. "You're coming down to see the dress rehearsal on the 5th, Mr. Lawless?" she struck in.
"It would be a treat to me, but I can't; I've somewhere else to go."
"It would be a 'treat' to him!" pealed Peggy. "We shall be kept in the theatre half the night—we shall be dog-tired—and he would find it a 'treat'! What it is to be young! Where have you to go, Mr. Dramatist?"
"I have to go to a very dull public dinner on the 5th," he said. "I shall think of you dog-tired in the Garden Act when they serve the chapon rôti."
"Send us the chapon rôti," she said, "it'd be much more use." She snatched a sprig of parsley from a dish and stuck it in her hair. "Mother always tried to kill my passion for dress!" she cried.
He proffered her mayonnaise, and she said she wanted to play the piano. Though he feared that even a landlady who was a terpsichorean gymnast might have objections to her rattling "Florodora" at one in the morning, his spirits were high until she forsook the music-stool and sank to reminiscence on the hearthrug. Then she made his heart ache; she told him some of her vicissitudes—no engagement, no money, no food. His eyes filled as he listened. What this girl had been through!
It was two o'clock He saw his guests home. (Rain was falling.) "Good-night—good-bye." He looked at Rumford Street for the last time—how familiar it had become! "Don't forget me," he heard himself whisper, clasping Peggy's hand. Her gaze assured him. She went in—the step was desolate; he turned thoughtfully away.
And as he walked back, to the room where she had been, he knew he was in love—with her, with the Theatre, with the life he used to lead. In the wet, black streets of Manchester he saw the naked truth, and he realised that his life was a failure. A man could change his environment, but not himself. He felt that he would be happier earning three pounds a week, like her, on the stage than he would ever be as Robert Blackstone, K.C. One mustn't say these things, but he felt it—felt that he would rejoice to be a minor actor again, and see Peggy in the morning, and see Peggy every day.
No Flies on Flossie tottered for six nights, died, and was buried. You may read those facts elsewhere. These are facts concerning No Flies on Flossie which you may read only here. And in Garden Court, Temple, there was for a long time a distinguished barrister debating a subtle point. He questioned if, when he made a trip to the past and grew enamoured of it, he fell in love with a girl, or only with an atmosphere. Because that he was in love, still in love, was indisputable; he looked back constantly and yearned. The sole doubt was, with what was he in love? It was the weak spot in the case, and with his usual keenness he had put his finger on it—he discerned how liable he was to be deceived, how naturally he might be attributing to the girl the fascination that belonged to the surroundings. If it was the atmosphere that lent Peggy enchantment, he would be insane to choose a wife so different from, say, the placid matron who blessed Edward. Per contra, if he loved Peggy herself, why should he tramp the room like this, instead of asking her to marry him?
He swore he did love the girl herself.
He trembled lest her halo was the limelight.
Then having come to a conclusion, he found her advertisement in The Stage, and wrote asking her to call on him "at Mr. Blackstone's chambers."
She went promptly. The dignified clerk ushered her into Robert's presence, and Robert had never seen that room look so gay.
"How good of you to come!" he exclaimed happily.
"How good of you to think of me, you mean!" she said—"I've been out ever since No Flies finished; have you written another piece, and are you going to offer me a good part in it? I say, you do know swells!"
"Who, Blackstone?"
She nodded. "Do you think he'll come in while I'm here? I was reading about him the other day—Miss Peggy Wilson would be going strong, meeting celebrities of the Bar. This is the Blackstone, isn't it, the K.C.?"
"He's a very recent K.C.," murmured Robert; "there's his new wig in that box."
"Oh, do let me look!" she said, darting radiantly. "May I?"
"You may even try it on, if you like," said Robert; "he wouldn't mind."
She had her hat-pins out in a second. "Oh, isn't Peggy going strong!" she laughed. "How does it suit me?" And then turning from the strip of glass, "Why are you so grave all of a sudden? Didn't you mean me to?"
"Yes, yes; I was thinking what a fool I had been not to beg you to come sooner," sighed Robert. "Take it off, and let me talk to you."
"Serious?"
"Very serious—an engagement."
"You are a trump," she said; "I wanted one so badly."
"Ah, but you mustn't accept this one unless you like it, and I hope you won't mind its being a short engagement. Peggy, I love you. I love the ground you walk on, and the clothes you wear, and everything you say and do. Will you be my wife?"
"Oh!" she gasped. Her face was colourless.
"Can't you care for me?"
"I do care," she whispered, and—It seemed incredible, yet they were round her! and his heart was thumping like a boy's. "Oh, my sweet!" he stammered, releasing her at last. Just like a boy again—"Oh, my sweet!"
And her colour had come back, and she smiled up at him, with the smile that no other woman had ever equalled. "Let me put on my hat before Blackstone comes in," she said joyously; "look what you've done to my hair—it'd give us away!"
"Peggy," said Robert; "I'm Blackstone."
The smile faded; she stood gazing at him wide-eyed.
"I called myself 'Lawless' when I wrote that farce, and then I chucked writing and went in for the Bar. I had forgotten all about the thing for years when I got Pink's note, but I couldn't resist going down to the Call; I went as a lark, nobody knew me, I thought it wouldn't make any difference. And then I met you, Peggy—and it made all the difference in the world. Why don't you laugh?"
"You are a great man," said the girl solemnly; "you oughtn't to marry me."
"Oh, my dearest dear," he cried, "don't you understand that I—the real 'I'—am the man you saw there, and that only you do see the real 'me'? London has forgotten the author of that piece, but he didn't die, darling—his heart's just the same, though he looks so different. Robert Blackstone's the man who wears the wig and gown, and can make things right for your mother and the youngsters, and who'll give you a title by-and-by, my love; but your husband'll be the bohemian who toasted the crumpets, and lodged at mademoiselle Superba's, the terpsichorean gymnast. You shan't have time to wish for anything—I'd like to buy the Earth for you!—and you must come to hear me speak, and I want you to be proud of our position; but at home I shall always be the 'boy' who fell in love with you, Peggy, the 'Bob Lawless' who went to look for his youth—and found it!"
Beyond the open window, the flowers of the garden were bright in sunshine, and the fountain tinkled dreamily. There was a nurse-maid with a child among the flowers; he knew with thanksgiving that he was doing well to marry.
"Will you kiss me again, sweetheart?"
"Yes," she said—"Bob!"
The End