VII
It was some months before the club yielded a practical return.
Wynne was seated in the hollow of a deep leather chair, and he overheard two men talking. One was Max Levis, London’s newest impresario, and the other Leonard Passmore, a producer of some standing, whose methods Wynne disapproved of very heartily.
“You’ve read the play?” queried Levis.
“Yes. I should say it was a certainty.”
“Thought you would—that’s capital! Wanted your opinion before writing to Quiltan.”
Wynne knew Quiltan by reputation. His Oxford verses had caused a stir, and the rare appearances of his articles were hailed enthusiastically by press and public alike. Lane Quiltan besides being gifted, was exceedingly well off—a reason, perhaps, for his small literary output.
Max Levis played with the pages of a manuscript copy of the play.
“Formed any views regarding the production?” he asked.
Mr. Passmore had formed many views, and proceeded to expound them at some length. He held forth for the best part of half an hour, while Wynne, from the screen of his chair, silently scorned every word he uttered.
“God!” he thought, “and these are the men who cater art to the nation!”
Presently the two men rose and walked toward the dining-room, heavy in talk. On the small table beside where they had sat lay the copy of the play. As the swing doors closed behind them Wynne picked it up and started to read.
Messrs. Levis and Passmore stayed long at their meat, and Wynne had read the play from cover to cover before they returned.
It was not often his heart went out to a contemporary’s work, but this was an exception. What he read filled him with delight, envy, and admiration. “Witches”—for so the play was called—possessed the rarest quality. There was wit, imagination, and satire, and it was written with that effortless ease at which all true artists should aim.
As he laid the copy back on the small table Wynne gave vent to an exclamation of indignant resentment, provoked by memories of the proposals Passmore had made in regard to the manner in which he proposed to interpret the work. Here was a thing of real artistic beauty, which was to be subjected to commercial mutilation by a cross-grained fool who had made a reputation by massing crowds in such positions that the centre of the stage was clear for the principals.
His feelings toward Mr. Passmore were not improved when that gentleman and Mr. Levis reoccupied their former chairs, and, warmed by wine, started to discuss their mutual follies.
With silent irritation Wynne rose and left the club. He arrived home about nine o’clock, where he inveighed against managers and producers, and the dunces who dance in high places. In the course of the tirade he explained the cause of his anger.
“There’s a real thing—and it’s good and right, and cram-jam full of exquisite possibilities. Those idiots haven’t begun to understand it—are blind to its beauty—haven’t a notion how good it is. In God’s name, why don’t they let me produce the thing?”
Then Eve had an inspiration which sent Wynne forth into the night, and found him, twenty minutes later, ringing the bell of a house in Clarges Street.
Taking into consideration the clothes he wore, and his general look of dilapidation, his attitude when the door was opened by an important footman was praiseworthy and remarkable.
He simply said “Thank you,” and stepped into the hall. Then he removed his hat and gave it to the man, saying, “Mr. Wynne Rendall.” The bluff resulted in his being ushered into a drawing-room, in which were a number of ladies and gentlemen.
“It is always easy to recognize one’s host in a mixed gathering, provided he does not know you,” commented Wynne, as the door closed, “for he is the person whose face betrays the greatest perplexity. How do you do, Mr. Quiltan?”
Lane Quiltan shook hands doubtfully, but not without interest. Out of politeness he said:
“I seem to know your name.”
“That’s unlikely,” replied Wynne, “for I have been at some pains to keep it in the background. One of these days, however, you will know it very much better.”
“Did you come here to tell me so?”
“Not altogether, although in a sense it is mixed up with my visit. To be frank, I came in the hope of finding you alone. Still, I suppose later on you will be.” He smiled engagingly.
Quiltan scarcely knew whether to be annoyed or amused. In deference to his guests, he chose the latter alternative.
“You seem to be an unconventional man, Mr. Rendall,” he laughed.
“Come, I had not looked for a compliment so soon; but perhaps you use the term correctively?”
“It is just possible, isn’t it?”
“And yet my conduct is nothing like so unconventional as the central character in ‘Witches’ ”—a remark which startled from Lane Quiltan: “What on earth do you know about ‘Witches’?”
Wynne smiled agreeably.
“I have relations of my own.”
“Doubtless, but I would like an answer to my question.”
He did not get it, for Wynne only repeated the smile, with a shade more satisfaction.
“I fear,” he said, “our conversation is proving very tiresome to your friends. Shall we talk in another room?”
“Extraordinary creature!” gasped a very splendid lady seated at the grand piano.
“It is what every one will be saying shortly,” returned Wynne, and won a laugh for the readiness of his wit.
“I suppose, Lane,” assumed a man who was airing the tails of his dress-coat before the fire—“I suppose we ought to take the hint and depart, but your friend is so devilish amusing I vote in favour of remaining.”
“Sir,” said Wynne, with very great solemnity, “if I vow to be devilish dull, will you in return vote in favour of going?” The laugh came his way again; and he proceeded, “I make the suggestion with the most generous motives, for if you remain with your coat-tails so perilously near the flame we shall be constrained to the inevitable necessity of putting you out.”
A youngish man, who was sitting in a corner, rose and shook the creases from his trousers and glanced at the clock.
“I at least have to go,” he said.
“You needn’t hurry away!”
Wynne touched Quiltan on the arm. “Never stay a pioneer,” he implored. “ ‘For the rest shall follow after by the bones upon the way,’ to quote Kipling.”
Ten minutes after his arrival he had cleared the room completely. The guests departed without apparent resentment: indeed, one lady gave Wynne her card, and said, “You positively must come and be amusing at one of my Thursdays.”
Quiltan was wearing an expression of some annoyance when he returned after bidding farewell to the last of the company.
“It is all very well,” he said; “but what precisely do you want?”
Before answering Wynne took an easy inspection of the man before him.
Lane Quiltan was tall, well built, and very pleasant to look upon. His features were attractive and regular, his voice and expression were compelling of confidence. At a glance Wynne summed him up as a “good fellow, and a good deal more.”
“Well?” said Quiltan.
“Primarily I have succeeded in doing what I wanted, and that was to convince you that I am no ordinary man. Secondly, I want to produce your play, ‘Witches,’ and if you will ask me to sit down for a minute I shall prove beyond argument why I am the only person who can do it justice.”
Lane Quiltan gestured Wynne to a chair, and seated himself.
“Fire away!” he said; “but I am afraid your chances are small. The play is already in the hands of Max Levis.”
“I know.”
“You seem pretty well acquainted with my affairs.”
“On the contrary, I know nothing about them. I knew Levis had the play, because I borrowed his copy without permission while the fellow was feeding.”
“Do you generally do things like that?”
“I have no general practices. I act as the inclination suggests. In this case it is fortunate for both of us that I did.”
“For both of us?”
“Certainly, for I mean to produce ‘Witches.’ ”
Quiltan laughed.
“At least you are persistent,” he said.
“I am, and you are not. You take things too easily, because you’ve all this”—he made an embracing gesture. “You are too sure, Mr. Quiltan, I know. You write this play and direct it to Max Levis, and then, because fame and money are merely accessories in your life, you take no further interest in the matter.”
“How do you arrive at that conclusion?”
“Simply enough. Why did you send the play to Levis? Do you admire his work so inordinately?”
“I know very little about him.”
“Exactly. Would you hand over a best child to be taught by some one who might be an idiot for all you knew? Two years ago Max Levis was a diamond buyer—what the devil should he know about plays?”
“He engages competent people to produce them.”
“And takes forty per cent. for doing so. Do you consider he is more qualified to engage competent people than you are?”
“I have never thought about it.”
“Then think about it now. Don’t spoil a fine work through artistic slackness and drift.”
“I like your enthusiasm.”
“You’d like my production better. Now, look here, I overheard Levis talking to Leonard Passmore about your play tonight. These are some of Passmore’s ideas. Tell me if you like ’em.”
Word for word he repeated the conversation of a couple of hours before.
“Were those your intentions, Mr. Quiltan?”
“No, not exactly.”
“What were?”
“I’m not a producer.”
“Of course you are not. You’re an author, and an author never knows where the good or bad in his own work lies. Your work is shining good—if the good can be brought out,—and you’d entrust it, without a thought, to a couple of merchants, with no more artistry or selection between ’em than a provincial auctioneer. Let me produce the play, and I’ll give you this—”
There was something dazzling in the sparkle of thoughts Wynne gave voice to as he discussed the possibilities of the play. He seemed to have grasped its living essence, and to have impregnated it with a spirit of higher worth than even the author had believed possible.
“And you could do that?”
“I can always do as I feel.”
Quiltan rose and paced the room excitedly.
“I believe in you,” he said. “I favour this co-operation. But what’d Levis say? He’d stick out for his own man.”
“Good heavens! What do you want with Levis? Back the venture yourself.”
“I—but—”
“God knows you’ve money enough.”
“I know nothing about theatres.”
“I know plenty.”
Quiltan paused and bit his forefinger.
“Take a theatre and do it ourselves?” he queried.
“Why not?”
“By the Lord, why not indeed! It ’ud be tremendous fun.”
“It ’ud be tremendous earnest.”
“Either way, I’m game.”
“Settled, then?”
“Yes, it’s settled.”
Wynne stood himself a cab from Clarges Street at three o’clock in the morning. He looked ten years younger as he burst into the room where Eve was waiting up for him.
“I’ve done it!” he cried. “I’ve done it! I’m on the road upward at last.”