CHAPTER XIII
The Russian Ballet opened with what was called on the program, "A ballet comi-dramatic by Warslav Nijinsky, entitled 'Till Eulenspiegel.'" It would have been more to the point to have scheduled it as a pantomime; at least, such a course would have proved somewhat illuminating to an audience a little in the dark concerning the nature of the entertainment to be set before it. San Francisco, schooled in the memory of hectic opera seasons with their inevitable pirouetting, tarlatan-skirted ballets, had come to the performance with a rather set notion as to what it had a right to expect. True, barefoot dancers by the score had swept in upon the town, and it had been ravished by the combined charms of Pavlova and Mordkin, but all of these novelties at least had ministered to an unsophisticated desire to see the principals starred in big type on the program and constantly in the limelight. Therefore when the curtain fell upon a ballet that was neither danced nor postured, and with the leading dancer of the troupe remaining in the picture instead of an arresting and flamboyant spot upon it, there was little wonder that the applause was at once perfunctory and puzzled.
Neither the dancers nor their new art was any novelty to Ned Stillman. He had seen both in Paris, and again in New York. But he had to confess that this third view was proving the most enjoyable of all, and he was amused and a trifle supercilious at the air of frank disapproval throughout the audience. Indeed, he became so interested in analyzing his fellow-townsmen's attitude that momentarily he forgot his box party was a challenge to any and all who cared to interest themselves in discovering his guests.
So far he had not been conscious of a single pair of opera-glasses turned their way and he began to feel at once cheated, but, if the truth were told, a trifle relieved. He knew almost as soon as he had committed to the venture that it was cheap and in bad taste, and yet he could not bring himself to the point of acknowledging his mistake. He had an uncomfortable feeling also that Claire Robson was facing the ordeal of a box with silent heroism, not that she was a woman vulgar enough to dread a conspicuous position in itself, but because she had an instinctive sense of what was fitting. He had not mentioned a box party when he had first asked her. He merely had said:
"How would you like a night off Friday?"
"A night off? I'm scheduled for a turn with Mrs. Condor."
"Well, and if she should be willing to let you go?"
She had assented eagerly, and when he mentioned the Russian Ballet she gave a cry of delight.
"Edington and his sister, Mrs. Forsythe, are going, too," he explained, rather hastily. "I.... I got a box this morning."
"A box?" Her voice had risen dubiously.
"There's nothing else left that is decent," he had lied to her.
But he saw that she was far from happy at the prospect, although she was too proud to voice any further protests.
Curiously enough, even Phil Edington had demurred.
"A box? What's the big idea? Why don't you get some seats in the orchestra?... Oh, I don't care a rap! Do as you want, but I thought that perhaps...."
At that point he had begun to grow irritated; he decided obstinately that his guests would either go in a box or remain at home.
Well, they had come in a box, and the audience appeared to be ignoring them. He had expected something more brilliant in the way of an assembly, but the house was dressed, on the whole, rather illy for the occasion, as San Francisco audiences quite often are. To begin with, the Valencia Theater was out of the beaten path, and a heavy rain was falling. This had the effect of making the prudent and frugal, who were denied the comfort of either limousines or taxis, decide on street costume instead of evening fripperies. Only the very smartest people could afford to ignore the elements, and even these were obliged to withstand the chill of a draughty playhouse by snuggling close into their opera cloaks and thus concealing the bare throats and flashing jewels that a more comfortable environment might have disclosed. On the whole, he was disappointed. One of his reasons for deciding upon a box was to give Claire the treat of a scintillating audience seen from a perfect vantage-point. But he had forgotten that his native town rarely dazzled the spectators except for grand opera at staggering prices, and even then there were always plenty of recalcitrant males in their business suits to spoil the picture. San Francisco had not yet reached the point where its men consciously and as a whole dressed for the occasion; there was still the sneer of effeminacy directed at those who insisted on taking seriously the matter of suitable raiment.
To-night Claire had made an effort at extreme simplicity. She was in severe black, open slightly at the throat, and a large artificial pink rose added a single note of color. Having no jewels, she wore none, and her hair fell away from her brow in a grace utterly natural and charming. He had always thought of her hair vaguely as dark—to-night, standing just behind her where the light searched out its half-tones, he discovered glinting bits that ran all the way from burnished copper to shining gold. During the first number she sat slightly forward, intent on letting no detail escape. When the curtain fell upon the whimsical Till dangling from a gibbet in the medieval market-place, Stillman leaned forward and said:
"What do you think of it?"
He did not realize how much it meant to have her strike just the proper note, until his heart bounded with satisfaction at her frank and unstudied answer:
"I really don't know, Mr. Stillman. It's so different. You see, I was looking for something more...."
She stopped suddenly as if it occurred to her that, after all, she could not say precisely just what she had been looking for. "But it's tremendously interesting, of course," she hastened to add.
He glowed even at her eagerness to make him understand that she was finding her very indecision a joy.
"Yes, it was the same with me ... at first," he reassured her. "I've seen this all before, you know ... abroad and in New York. Not precisely this act, but something along the same lines."
"I almost missed placing Nijinsky," she hesitated. "It was all rather mystical and vague.... And those subdued lights.... I wish I could see it all again, now that I've caught my breath. It ... it rather...."
"Dazzles one," supplemented Stillman, leaning nearer and nearer.
A tremor ran through her and he realized with a start that his breath was falling heavily upon her bare neck. He drew back. Mrs. Forsythe had stopped in a casual survey of the house to fix upon an object of interest. She dropped the glasses into her lap as she turned toward Stillman:
"Who can that be, down there in the lower box, staring so at us?" she asked, indicating the position with an exaggerated glance.
Stillman stood up.
"The man with the bald head?" he heard Claire volunteer. "Why, that is Mr. Flint—Mr. Sawyer Flint."
"Why, yes, of course," he caught Mrs. Forsythe drawling in a tone of self-confessed stupidity. "Anybody ought to know him."
"Or his wife," broke in Edington. "One can't miss her.... Now, she's getting the habit. I declare everybody seems to be interested. I guess it's you, Miss Robson. You must be the attraction."
"The orchestra has come back," Stillman announced, deliberately. "What's next?"
"'Papillons,' a ballet in one act," Edington called out, reading from his program.
"Music by Robert Schumann," supplemented Mrs. Forsythe.
"Ah, now we shall see the wonderful Bolm!" Stillman said to Claire. "They say he's the finest pantomimist on the stage." She turned slightly toward him with a movement of appeal. "What is it?" he whispered.
"Just Flint," she answered, grasping his wrist in a swift, backward gesture. "He keeps on staring."
"What? Shall we change places?"
"No. That would be too.... It's no matter. What did you say the star's name was?... There, the curtain is going up!"
Stillman fell back, but as he did so he took a sweeping survey of the lower box. Flint was still staring, and his wife was doing a great deal of vehement talking and head-shaking to the other women sharing their hospitality.
"Papillons" proved more in the conventional manner and it was charmingly danced by a score of pretty girls in early-eighteenth-century costume, and wonderfully acted by Bolm in the character of Pierrot. The audience warmed unmistakably at this number, and, the draughts somewhat subsiding, a few venturesome ladies decided to shed their wraps. Chatter became more general and less controversial; the house began to look about, taking note of itself, assuming the critical airs of a peacock staring at its own reflection. Opera-glasses circled the occupants of the boxes, and Stillman tried to single out all those who let their gaze linger an insolent length of time upon his party. But the occupants of Flint's box kept casting furtive glances in Claire's direction, and Flint himself continued to look up every now and then, reaching for the glasses, which always seemed in his wife's possession, every time he did so. Stillman felt his anger rising. He knew that Claire was annoyed, but she had recovered her poise and began to talk enthusiastically about the second number.
"I understood that better." She smiled at Stillman. "I know the music, too. That always helps a great deal, don't you think?... What a tragic face Bolm has! I thought his gesture of remorse at having broken the butterfly's wing wonderfully expressive. Didn't you? The costumes were quaint and lovely. Oh, I can't tell you how glad I am that I came!"
"La Princesse Enchantée," a duet featuring Nijinsky, came next, and a gorgeous spectacle entitled "Cleopatra" concluded the performance. By this time the audience had recovered its good-nature and it poured forth into the violent shower with much animation and no end of laughter. Stillman had ordered his car for eleven o'clock, but through some mischance it was at least fifteen minutes late in appearing. This meant that his party stood huddled in a little group by the box-office railing, and every one who passed gave them either casual or pointed glances. Claire, lacking a suitable wrap, looked rather disconsolate and dowdy in a long black ulster. Stillman felt annoyed. As luck would have it, the Flints were for some reason in the same predicament. They had swept bravely past to their intended swift departure, only to find the call for their car unanswered, and had fallen back on the opposite side of the foyer. Over the sea of faces the two groups stood and unconsciously glared at one another—at least Stillman glared for his party, and Flint, sensing his friend's antagonism, returned the compliment with added insolence.
Stillman's car came first.
Mrs. Forsythe, starting on ahead with Edington, called a gay farewell across the now empty entrance-way to Mrs. Flint. The latter responded with freezing politeness. Stillman gave Claire his arm. Flint broke into a laugh and turned with a shrug to his wife.
Stillman heard the laugh and stopped short. He released Claire's arm and left her standing almost in the drip of the awnings as he turned and walked rapidly toward Flint.
"Will you be good enough to quit staring?" he said distinctly. "Your attentions to my party have been extremely annoying all evening."
Flint looked at first stunned, then rather frightened. Stillman was conscious that Edington had come up to him and was pulling at his coat sleeve.
Mrs. Forsythe and Claire were just stepping into the machine when the two men followed. Stillman took his place beside Claire and he felt the trembling pressure of her body as he reached over and slammed the door. Mrs. Forsythe made no comment.... It was Edington who broke the silence.
"That Russian stuff may be art," he broke out, "but I'll take a George M. Cohan rag-time revue any day!"
Stillman's brush with Flint was only the beginning of a series of misadventures. At the Café Chantant it happened that the Flint table was next to the Stillman party. Flint had recovered his bravado and he ordered another table in unmistakable tones. It followed that every one in the room turned their attention to the late-comers, and it was not long after Flint had been escorted in triumph to a remote location that Stillman became aware how many eyes were being turned at him and Claire Robson.
Presently Lily Condor sang, accompanied by Miss Menzies. Stillman knew that she had sighted them with her usual keen eye, but he also saw that she was determined to ignore Claire's friendly glances. When she finished she swept from the improvised platform and walked deliberately past Stillman, seating herself at the table which the Flints had deserted. Miss Menzies followed. Claire, turning after them with a wistful look of recognition, bowed to Lily Condor as she took her seat. The lady stared coldly ahead and beckoned a waiter. Claire blushed.
"What do you suppose," she said in a low voice to Stillman. "Are you quite sure it was all right ... my deserting Mrs. Condor to-night? Perhaps I ought to have rung her up myself. But you said...."
Stillman ordered wine. Edington chattered flippantly. Dancing commenced. Stillman pushed back his chair and said to Claire:
"Shall we begin?"
She rose in answer, and they swung into a one-step. He could feel her trembling under the glances which he realized were coming from every part of the room. What was she imagining, he wondered. As they circled about for the second time, Stillman became conscious that some one was walking across the floor in a deliberate attempt to waylay them. He stopped. Mrs. Ffinch-Brown stood before them. She had a deceitfully sweet smile on her lips and her small eyes were full of malicious determination.
"My dear Mr. Stillman ... will you excuse me?" she said. "I want a word with Claire ... about something important. Otherwise I shouldn't have interrupted. You'll understand."
He released Claire and she went to the edge of the dancing-space. Mrs. Ffinch-Brown turned her back upon Stillman, but Claire's face was unscreened from his gaze. Whatever Mrs. Ffinch-Brown was saying, Claire made no reply. The younger woman paled a trifle, Stillman thought, but otherwise she gave no sign. She returned to Stillman and they finished the dance. As he held her hand, he could feel her pulse beating with something more than the exertion of dancing.
Edington had been taking a turn himself with his sister.
"Did you know," he volunteered by way of conversation, "that there had been a devil of a row among the women running this show? Sis says that she understands they almost pulled one another's hair in committee over some performer that Mrs. Flint didn't think desirable. That woman and her prejudices are a scream! I'll bet it was some pretty girl caught making eyes at the old man. Well, here's looking at you!"
They all lifted their glasses. Claire's hand trembled.
After that things grew more and more confused. He was wondering what Mrs. Ffinch-Brown had found to say to her niece, and staring at Claire, when she leaned over toward him with a gesture of apology and said:
"I don't want to break up your party, Mr. Stillman, but really I think I must be going. My mother, you know.... She wasn't so well to-day. It doesn't seem right for me to stay here enjoying myself ... under the circumstances."
It had ended in their all leaving, Mrs. Forsythe pleading boredom and Edington insisting that he had planned to get home fairly early to go over his draft questionnaire.
"When you see me again, Miss Robson, it's just possible that I'll be a very grand party in uniform," Edington had announced, lightly, as they rose from the table.
In the coat-room he said to Stillman:
"You ought to go slow, Ned.... That Miss Robson is a nice girl."
"Slow? What do you mean?"
"Just what I say.... She's a nice girl, I tell you—a damned nice girl!"
Stillman smiled disagreeably.... He remembered a time when he would have resented Edington's cryptic insinuations, but now he merely smiled, a wide smile, which a betraying mirror duplicated unpleasantly. At the departure of Edington and his sister he turned to Claire significantly:
"Are you really ready to go home?"
She turned a very candid gaze upon him. "No, I can't say that I am."
"Where shall it be, then?"
"Anywhere," she answered, almost passionately. "Anywhere at all."
"Let's go to Tait's ... first!"
She assented indifferently, and presently Tait's was an accomplished pilgrimage. They had chosen to go up-stairs to the Pavo Real. At this hour there was still a fair crush going through the motions of dancing upon a crowded floor and the scene assaulted Stillman's perceptions with a suggestion of flashy squalor. It seemed an impossible place in which to indulge a mood, but he suffered the steward to find them a small table in a far corner. He ordered a Bénédictine and brandy for himself, Claire compromised on a crème de menthe, frappéed. The pale green of this last rather innocuous drink shone out like a bit of liquid jade against the black of Claire's gown as she bent over for a momentary sip. To Stillman there had always been a heavy-lidded suggestion about the stilly-green beauty of jade, a beauty glamorous with the Orient, white-heated as noon and as cold as the yellow glances of the moon. And, sitting there, he remembered the family tradition of a Stillman in the days when the first ships had come from China, their holds bursting with strange treasures and the haunting odors of sandalwood, a Stillman who brought a slave-girl back to affront and shock the staid provincials of his native town.... Presently the green liquid was gone and only the cool, white trickle of melting ice remained in the tiny glass opposite his. Claire moved this symbol of spent delights to one side.
"I suppose you know," she said, calmly, "why I left the Palace Hotel to-night."
He was not sure.
"My aunt asked me to leave.... She was very polite about it ... and very cutting. It appears I'm not quite their sort."
"No?" Stillman found himself laughing uneasily. "How gratified you must be!"
She put out a hand across the table, laying it lightly on his arm.
"Listen. It's really nothing to be flippant about.... Not that I care, in a way. But really, you know, you should have told me about—about that little arrangement with Mrs. Condor."
"Ah, then they dragged that in, too!" escaped him. "Your aunt must be a rapid talker!"
"Oh, it doesn't take long to cover the ground when one female relation decides to be nasty to another.... And, then, I'm not quite a fool—now.... Understand, I'm not blaming you ... but it would have been fairer if I had known."
He leaned forward eagerly. "Would you, in that case, have...."
"It's possible," she broke in suddenly. "Of course I've suspected something from the first ... and ... well, as a matter of fact...." She shrugged and reached again for her frappé, sliding a cherry from the crumpled straw, drooping over the glass's rim, toward her mouth. Stillman found the gesture charming, but he was not sure whether her answer suited him or not. Of course, she had seen through and accepted the transparencies of his first business ruse. But she also had subtly urged its justification. In this case.... In other words, she might accept gratuities under pressure! He felt that he was narrowing his spiritual eyes as he watched her cutting the bright red of the cherry with her white lips.
"And then," she went on, suddenly, touching the soft ice in the glass before her with a shrinking finger, "aside from everything else, what you planned to-night was stupid.... How could you have imagined that I cared."
"That you cared!" He felt that he was laughing with sneering bitterness. "Do you always think of yourself? How about me? What if I cared? It's possible, you know—just possible!"
She brought her hands suddenly up in a movement of clasped defense. He hung on her reply with white-lipped eagerness.
"Possible?..." she echoed. "They say anything is possible, but ... somehow men...."
She threw him a glance of thinly veiled mockery. His tension relaxed. She had merely parried the blow and he felt disappointed.
"I realize now," she went on, "what a frightful nuisance I've been.... The first time we met.... I was in trouble then, I remember. That sort of thing grows to be a habit.... You meant it for the best, of course, but this time you pushed me in pretty far ... I mean into your debt. I wish I knew how I could repay you."
"I'm willing to accept a deferred payment," he chaffed. "I'll take your note.... I'm very patient at waiting."
She looked at him clearly, almost too clearly, as if in one flashing moment she saw behind the mask of his banter.... He began to wonder ... had he hoped to have her flinch, recoil, or was this cool calm more acceptable?
"I see," she was saying, "you're determined to plunge me in deeper and deeper, until one day ... well, one day I'll be a bankrupt, won't I?"
He leaned across the trivial width of the table and he put two burning hands upon her icy-cold fingers. "Ah, but think how rich I shall be!"
She said nothing. She did not even draw back from his scorching touch. But this time she lowered her eyes, twisting in her left hand the crumpled straw divested of its gaudy sweetmeat.... She was a tired woman, he could see that plainly—a tired woman ... considering. And he was not even moved to pity.
"Come," he said, roughly. "Let's get out of this ghastly hole."
She rose with a fluttering movement that gave him the impression of a trapped bird. They made their way out in silence. A great primitive eagerness struck down every acquired virtue within him. He put his hand at her elbow and held it tight. He felt that she had clenched her fist.
In the doorway she shrank back suddenly as he stood waiting to lift her into the flaming yellow taxi answering their call. He retraced his steps.
"What.... Are you ill?"
"No ... for the moment I thought I saw.... Really it's of no consequence!"
He narrowed his eyes upon her. She was lying ... it was of consequence! He felt very ugly.... A man had just brushed past and now he stood with a finger upon the elevator bell, waiting.
Claire darted out and gained the taxi.... Stillman followed. As he swung open the door for her he felt her almost leap into its depths. Once inside, she faced him, barring the eagerness of his entrance with a defiant arm.
"Go away!" she cried, in a sudden terror. "Go away! Can't you see?... It's all over, I tell you!"
"All over?" He squared himself doggedly.
"Yes," she said, thickly. "Go away.... You had better go ... to ... to your wife!"
He fell back as if she had given him a sharp push. His hat had fallen to the ground. He stooped to pick it up. He heard the door slam and saw the taxi shoot forward into the sadly glamorous beauty of the night.... He was alone!
He strode back into the café entrance. The man was still waiting before the door of the tardy elevator. Stillman went up and put an insinuating hand upon his shoulder. The man turned.
"Oh, I beg your pardon," Stillman stammered. "I thought you were.... I see I am mistaken. Pray forgive me!"
A flash of white teeth answered Stillman's apology. The door of the elevator opened. The stranger entered.
Stillman turned away. Where had he seen that face before? Where?... Oh yes, the Serbian who had....
He felt cold.... The whole thing was absurd. Yet, she had seen some one who.... He lit a cigarette.... Suddenly he laughed a smothered, choking, unpleasant laugh.
He decided to go home.