THE NIGHT OF NIGHTS: THE PRINCESS IN THE TRANSFORMATION SCENE
If the police believed Christina when she revived enough to say that it had seemed to her as if the hair were soaked in blood it was more than Herrick did. He only wondered that they let her go and if they were perhaps not spreading a net about her as they had spread one about Denny.
But thereafter she was very composed, allowed herself to be taken quietly home, and took a sedative so as to get some sleep. Herrick came in from an errand at four and found the house subdued to the ordinary atmosphere—high-pressured enough in itself—of the house of an actress before a big first night.
Down in the drawing-room Mrs. Hope said they must not talk about anything exciting or Christina would be sure to feel it. But she herself seemed to feel that the fact of her coming appearance in the Inghams' box was about the only satisfactory piece of calmness in connection with her daughter's future. She congratulated herself anew upon the outcome of an old bout with Christina in which the girl had wished to go to supper afterward with Wheeler rather than with the devoted Inghams, and in which Mrs. Hope had unwontedly conquered. She said now that she wished she had spoken to the Inghams about inviting Herrick; it could have been arranged so easily.
When Christina came in she allowed herself to be fondly questioned as to how she felt and even to be petted and pitied. She was perhaps no more like a person in a dream than she would have been before the same occasion if Ingham had never been shot; when she spoke at all she varied between the angelic and the snappish; and before very long she excused herself and went to her room. She was to have a light supper sent up and Mrs. Hope adjured Herrick not to worry!
He duly sent his roses and his telegram of good wishes, but that she could really interest herself in the play at such a time seemed horrible to him and he arrived at the theater still puzzled and rather resentful of the intrusion of this unreal issue.
But the first thrill of the lighted lobby, glowing and odorous with the stands of Christina's flowers; the whirr of arriving motors; the shining of jeweled and silken women with bare shoulders and softly pluming hair; the expectant crowd; the managerial staff, in sacrificial evening dress, smiling nervously, catching their lips with their teeth; the busy movements of uniformed ushers; the clapping down of seats; the high, light chatter, a little forced, a little false, sparkling against the memory of those darker issues that clung about Christina's skirts; the whole, thrilling, judging, waiting house; all this began to affect Herrick like strong drink on jaded nerves. From his seat in the third row he observed Mrs. Hope and the Inghams take their places; the attention of the audience leaped like lightning on them. Just then one man came into the box opposite and drawing his chair into its very front, sat down. It was Cuyler Ten Euyck.
Herrick forgot him quickly enough. It was a real play, acted by real artists; the production held together by a master hand; and it continued to string up Herrick's nerves even while to himself he scarcely seemed to notice it. He had had no idea that it would be so terrible to live through the moment of Christina's entrance. He sat with his eyes on his program, suffering her nervousness, feeling under what an awful handicap she was waiting there, the other side of that painted canvas, to lose or win. There was the wracking suspense of waiting for her, and then, as in a dream, the sound of her voice. Her dear, familiar voice! She was there! She was there; radiant, unshadowed, exulting in the flood of light, at home, at ease; softly, shyly, proudly bending to the swift welcome and carrying, after that, the hearts of the audience in her hand. She had only to go on, now, from triumph to triumph; her sun swam to the meridian and blazed there with a splendid light. Mrs. Hope with lowered eyes, breathed deep of a success that passed her dreams; Ten Euyck, compressing his lips, his arms folded, never took his eyes from Christina's face. And Bryce Herrick, watching her move, watching her speak, not accepting this, as did the public, for a gift from heaven, but aware to the bone of its being all made ground, of the art that had lifted her as it were from off the wrack into this divine power of breathing and creating loveliness, could have dropped down before her and begged to be forgiven.
Who was he to have judged her?—to-day or last night? to have exacted from her a line of conduct? to have tried to force upon her the motives and the standards of tame, of ordinary women? He remembered having often smiled, however tenderly, at her pretensions; not having taken quite seriously her attitude to her work. And here was a genius of the first order, whose gifts and whose beauty would remain a happy legend in the hearts of men when he was dust; whose name youth would carry on its lips for inspiration when no one would care that he had ever been born! Oh, dear and beautiful Diana who had stooped to a mortal! For this was the secret thrill that ran like wildfire through the homage of his heart—the knowledge that she loved him, and the feel of her lips on his!
Let them worship, poor creatures, poor mob! Unknowing and unguessing that between him and her there was a bond that crossed the footlights—the memory of a dark room and firelight, a girl in his arms.—"Bryce dear, are we engaged? You haven't said?—I've wanted you—Oh, how I've wanted you—all my life!"—At the end of the performance it was impossible not to try to see her; not to get a word with her, to confess and to have absolution.
But at the stage-door there were so many people that he could not have endured to share his minute with them. He knew the Babel that it must be inside, and he decided to wait here; by-and-by the Inghams wouldn't grudge him a moment. They seemed to stay forever; but at last all were gone but two or three, and he decided to send in his card. As he stepped forward the door opened, and Christina, in the oblong of light, stood drawing on her gloves.
She was dressed as if for a coronation and not even upon the stage had the effulgence of her beauty seemed so drawn together for conquest. Her long white gown had threads of silver in it; the white cloak thrown back from her shoulders did not conceal her lovely throat nor the long string of diamonds that to Herrick's amazement were twisted round her neck and fell down along her breast; she carried on one arm a great white sheaf of orchids, and Iphigenia led to the sacrifice was surely not so pale.
Upon her appearance the closed motor which had been waiting across the street swept into place. It was a magnificent car, lined with white; the little curtains at the windows were drawn back and a low electric lamp showed the swinging vases of orchids and white violets. Christina turned her eyes from it till they met Herrick's; for a moment they widened as if galvanized, and then, with a sweet, icy bow, she went right past him. A man who had jumped out of the motor got in after her, and closed the door. It was the man who had sat all alone in the stage box; Cuyler Ten Euyck.