Adventure stories; City and town life -- Fiction; London (England) -- Fiction
"Rather!" Mr. Marrier gaily soothed him, as he went over to the
telephone. And Mr. Marrier's bright, boyish face radiated forth the
assurance that nothing in all his existence had more completely filled
him with sincere joy than this enterprise of procuring a photograph
of the party. Even in giving the photographer's number--he was one
of those prodigies who remember infallibly all telephone numbers--his
voice seemed to gloat upon his project.
(And while Mr. Marrier, having obtained communication with the
photographer, was saying gloriously into the telephone: "Yes,
Wilkins's. No. Quite private. I've got Miss Rose Euclid here, and Mr.
Seven Sachs"--while Mr. Marrier was thus proceeding with his list of
star attractions, Edward Henry was thinking:
"'_Her_ new theatre'--now! It was 'his' a few minutes back!... 'The
well-known Midlands capitalist,' eh? Oh! Ah!")
He drank again. He said to himself: "I've had all I can digest of this
beastly balloony stuff." (He meant the champagne.) "If I finish the
glass I'm bound to have a bad night." And he finished the glass, and
planked it down firmly on the table.
"Well," he remarked aloud cheerfully. "If we're to be photographed, I
suppose we shall want a bit more light on the subject."
Joseph sprang to the switches.
"Please!" Carlo Trent raised a protesting hand.
The switches were not turned. In the beautiful dimness the greatest
tragic actress in the world and the greatest dramatic poet in the
world gazed at each other, seeking and finding solace in mutual
esteem.
"I suppose it wouldn't do to call it the Euclid Theatre?" Rose
questioned casually, without moving her eyes.
"Splendid!" cried Mr. Marrier from the telephone.
"It all depends whether there are enough mathematical students in
London to fill the theatre for a run," said Edward Henry.
"Oh! D'you think so?" murmured Rose, surprised and vaguely puzzled.
At that instant Edward Henry might have rushed from the room and
taken the night-mail back to the Five Towns, and never any more have
ventured into the perils of London, if Carlo Trent had not turned his
head, and signified by a curt, reluctant laugh that he saw the joke.
For Edward Henry could no longer depend on Mr. Seven Sachs. Mr. Seven
Sachs had to take the greatest pains to keep the muscles of his face
in strict order. The slightest laxity with them--and he would have
been involved in another and more serious suffocation.
"No," said Carlo Trent, "'The Muses' Theatre' is the only possible
title. There is money in the poetical drama." He looked hard at Edward
Henry, as though to stare down the memory of the failure of Nashe's
verse. "I don't want money. I hate the thought of money. But money is
the only proof of democratic appreciation, and that is what I need,
and what every artist needs.... Don't you think there's money in the
poetical drama, Mr. Sachs?"
"Not in America," said Mr. Sachs. "London is a queer place."
"Look at the runs of Stephen Phillips's plays!"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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