“I think she means to have a jolly good try.”
“But Sir Derek has his own money, hasn’t he? I mean, it’s not like when Sir Courtenay Travers fell in love with the milk-maid and was dependent on his mother, the Countess, for everything. Sir Derek can afford to do what he pleases, can’t he?”
Parker shook his head tolerantly. The excellence of the cigar and the soothing qualities of the whisky-and-soda had worked upon him, and he was feeling less ruffled.
“You don’t understand these things,” he said. “Women like her ladyship can talk a man into anything and out of anything. I wouldn’t care, only you can see the poor girl is mad over the feller. What she finds attractive in him, I can’t say, but that’s her own affair.”
“He’s very handsome, Horace, with those flashing eyes and that stern mouth,” argued Mrs Parker.
Parker sniffed.
“Have it your own way,” he said. “It’s no treat to me to see his eyes flash, and if he’d put that stern mouth of his to some better use than advising the guv’nor to lock up the cigars and trouser the key, I’d be better pleased. If there’s one thing I can’t stand,” said Parker, “it’s not to be trusted!” He lifted his cigar and looked at it censoriously. “I thought so! Burning all down one side. They will do that if you light ’em careless. Oh, well,” he continued, rising and going to the humidor, “there’s plenty more where that came from. Out of evil cometh good,” said Parker philosophically. “If the guv’nor hadn’t been in such a overwrought state tonight, he’d have remembered not to leave the key in the key-hole. Help yourself to another glass of port, Ellen, and let’s enjoy ourselves!”
2.
When one considers how full of his own troubles, how weighed down with the problems of his own existence the average playgoer generally is when he enters a theatre, it is remarkable that dramatists ever find it possible to divert and entertain whole audiences for a space of several hours. As regards at least three of those who had assembled to witness its opening performance, the author of “Tried by Fire,” at the Leicester Theater, undoubtedly had his work cut out for him.
It has perhaps been sufficiently indicated by the remarks of Parker, the valet, that the little dinner at Freddie Rooke’s had not been an unqualified success. Searching the records for an adequately gloomy parallel to the taxi-cab journey to the theatre which followed it, one can only think of Napoleon’s retreat from Moscow. And yet even that was probably not conducted in dead silence. There must have been moments when Murat got off a good thing or Ney said something worth hearing about the weather.
The only member of the party who was even remotely happy was, curiously enough, Freddie Rooke. Originally Freddie had obtained three tickets for “Tried by Fire.” The unexpected arrival of Lady Underhill had obliged him to buy a fourth, separated by several rows from the other three. This, as he had told Derek at breakfast, was the seat he proposed to occupy himself.
It consoles the philosopher in this hard world to reflect that, even if man is born to sorrow as the sparks fly upwards, it is still possible for small things to make him happy. The thought of being several rows away from Lady Underhill had restored Freddie’s equanimity like a tonic. It thrilled him like the strains of some grand, sweet anthem all the way to the theatre. If Freddie Rooke had been asked at that moment to define happiness in a few words, he would have replied that it consisted in being several rows away from Lady Underhill.
The theatre was nearly full when Freddie’s party arrived. The Leicester Theatre had been rented for the season by the newest theatrical knight, Sir Chester Portwood, who had a large following; and, whatever might be the fate of the play in the final issue, it would do at least one night’s business. The stalls were ablaze with jewelry and crackling with starched shirt-fronts; and expensive scents pervaded the air, putting up a stiff battle with the plebeian peppermint that emanated from the pit. The boxes were filled, and up in the gallery grim-faced patrons of the drama, who had paid their shillings at the door and intended to get a shilling’s-worth of entertainment in return, sat and waited stolidly for the curtain to rise.