“I know. I know they like them once they’re there, and they see them. But they don’t come again. They crowd the Empire—and the Empire is only pictures now; and it’s much cheaper to run.”
He watched her dismally.
“I can’t believe they want nothing but pictures. I can’t believe they want everything in the flat,” he said, coaxing and miserable. He himself was not interested in the film. His interest was still the human interest in living performers and their living feats. “Why,” he continued, “they are ever so much more excited after a good turn, than after any film.”
“I know they are,” said Alvina. “But I don’t believe they want to be excited in that way.”
“In what way?” asked Mr. May plaintively.
“By the things which the artistes do. I believe they’re jealous.”
“Oh nonsense!” exploded Mr. May, starting as if he had been shot. Then he laid his hand on her arm. “But forgive my rudeness! I don’t mean it, of cauce! But do you mean to say that these collier louts and factory girls are jealous of the things the artistes do, because they could never do them themselves?”
“I’m sure they are,” said Alvina.
“But I can’t believe it,” said Mr. May, pouting up his mouth and smiling at her as if she were a whimsical child. “What a low opinion you have of human nature!”
“Have I?” laughed Alvina. “I’ve never reckoned it up. But I’m sure that these common people here are jealous if anybody does anything or has anything they can’t have themselves.”