“When we’ve got the trams, I shall buy a new machine and finer lenses, and I shall extend my premises.”
Mr. May did not talk business to Alvina. He was terribly secretive with respect to business. But he said to her once, in the early year following their opening:
“Well, how do you think we’re doing, Miss Houghton?”
“We’re not doing any better than we did at first, I think,” she said.
“No,” he answered. “No! That’s true. That’s perfectly true. But why? They seem to like the programs.”
“I think they do,” said Alvina. “I think they like them when they’re there. But isn’t it funny, they don’t seem to want to come to them. I know they always talk as if we were second-rate. And they only come because they can’t get to the Empire, or up to Hathersedge. We’re a stop-gap. I know we are.”
Mr. May looked down in the mouth. He cocked his blue eyes at her, miserable and frightened. Failure began to frighten him abjectly.
“Why do you think that is?” he said.
“I don’t believe they like the turns,” she said.
“But look how they applaud them! Look how pleased they are!”