‘Now, don’t be afraid to let go,’ said Miss Belmont ‘Let us have it as if the house was full.’
So Paul threw down his part as arranged, for by this time he knew the words of this one scene, and what with the wine and the growing sense of freedom, he did pretty well, and when he sat in the arm-chair with his face in his hands Miss Belmont no longer gabbled her lines, but spoke them with all the feeling and fervour of which she was mistress. And when she came to her ‘Good-bye, good-bye,’ Paul, who at all times was easily emotional, was crying softly. He rose with outspread arms and the tears on his face and his voice broke. The leading lady rushed at him and clipped him round the neck, and Paul clipped the leading lady in a perfectly innocent enthusiasm and strained her to his breast.
‘You—little—devil!’ she whispered, as she drew away from him and stabbed him with one wicked flash of her blue eyes. ‘I’ll forgive you this time,’ she added half a minute later; ‘but it isn’t professional.’
‘Time for one more run through, ladies and gentlemen,’ said the stage-manager, and once more the task began.
Miss Belmont’s eyes plagued Paul most of the time, now with a look of serious affront, now with a sort of mocking challenge. Now, he was inclined to try that grip again to see how she would take it, and the mocking eyes invited him. Then he dared not so much as think of it, for the eyes looked severe offence at him. When the time came he was like a wooden doll handling a wooden doll.
‘Pooh!’ said Miss Belmont, pettishly drawing back from him. ‘That won’t do. Try again.’
They harked back to the beginning of the scene. The others had stolen away to their various dressing-rooms. Only the stage-manager was left, and he was engaged in talking with the leader of the orchestra, who had just come in with a fiddle-case beneath his arm peeping out from his shabby paletot The farewell speech came, and it was only breathed. She had always dearly, dearly loved him. She had lost him by her pride, her coquetry—her silly, silly, heartless coquetry. Her fingers touched him on the cheek soft as a snowflake, and lingered there whilst the cooing voice went on. Then came the ‘Good-bye’ again and the answering call. She paused and looked, and darted to him, and they clung together, she leaning back her head and tangling his eyes in hers.
‘You hold me like that,’ she breathed, ‘until the curtain falls,’
She released herself gradually from his embrace, and drew away. Paul’s pulses beat to a strange tune, and he was afraid to look at her.
‘Ah!’ she said, in a voice so commonplace that he jumped to hear it, ‘the kind creatures have left us half a bottle. One glass, Mr. Armstrong, will do you good. You dress with Berry; hell help you with your make-up. Don’t be nervous. You’ve got the book to prop you till the very end, and there you’ll be as right as rain. Here’s luck to your first appearance.’