"You'll get over it, my dear," she said. "It's not an art, merely a matter of temperament. If acting were creative one could take it seriously, but it isn't. The author creates; the actor only represents. When I'm acting I often feel like the inside of a moving picture show. It's all mechanical."
"But," said Alexandra, "you weren't always like that? When you first went on the stage—"
"I felt as you do, all emotion and inexperience. Now that I've lived and am disillusioned I know that the stage is only a business, and not a very edifying one. The public don't see that side of it, fortunately. They think only of the amusement it provides. If they would stop there it wouldn't matter: but they have such a mania for everything theatrical in this country, such a desire to penetrate beyond the footlights, that they quite forget the necessity for a curtain between the make-believe of the stage and themselves. They're like a child with a toy. They want to see the inside mechanism, and directly they do they suffer the usual disappointment. I never take people 'behind'; if I do I always find they never again want to pay for a seat 'in front.' We're only shop-keepers, after all, and shop-keepers don't invite their customers behind the counter, any more than the customers are in the habit of asking their butcher or their baker to dinner. Somehow you can't get the public to see things like that. Instead of keeping members of the stage at a distance, treating them like kennel-dogs, they invite them to their houses and pamper them. It makes them more conceited and self-sufficient than they are already. I don't deny that a few actors and actresses are decently born and bred, indoor dogs, so to speak, knowing their manners; but that's no reason why the whole pack should be made free of the public's drawing rooms.... Let us walk up to the cathedral and spend a quiet hour there."
The tour had opened in a small cathedral town, and the three hours spent at the theater each night hardly counted in their daily round. They motored about the surrounding country, or read, talked and did needlework in the private sitting room of their quiet hotel. Such a life, placid and yet full of pleasant occupation, was delightful to Alexandra. She found the weekly change from town to town exhilarating, and the journey each Sunday in Mrs. Lambert's comfortable landaulette a luxurious mode of traveling.
At the end of their first week Chalfont came down and remained with them for the rest of the tour. Both he and Mrs. Lambert treated Alexandra on terms of equality so that she never felt an intruder on their intimacy. Before her they made no secret of their attachment, but she never regarded it as anything more close than what might exist between old and tried friends. Sometimes she detected in Mrs. Lambert quite a sisterly attitude toward Lord Chalfont. That was probably accounted for by the differences in their ages, she being a few years the elder.
Chalfont often asked after Maggy. He had quite an open admiration for her, which Mrs. Lambert shared. But, unlike him, she seldom asked for news of her. At the time, Alexandra did not notice this apparent lack of interest. She was not able to impart anything about Maggy for the simple reason that she had not heard from her. Only twice during the early days of the tour had there been a letter from her. After that, although Alexandra repeatedly wrote, she got no reply. She could not help wondering at this silence. It was not like Maggy. Later, when she spoke of it to Mrs. Lambert, the latter did not seem surprised.
"You're sure to hear from her soon. She may be away," she said.
And a letter did arrive from Maggy shortly afterwards. It was written in pencil and strangely shaky, quite unlike her habitual hand, which although childish, was remarkably firm. She said very little, confirmed Mrs. Lambert's prophecy by admitting that she had been away for a change, owing to which she had not received Alexandra's letters until her return. She ended with a postscript which had evidently been added in a burst of feeling.
"I love Fred more than ever, Lexie. I couldn't exist without him. He has been such a dear since I got back."
Alexandra passed it across the breakfast table to Mrs. Lambert, with the remark: