The time did not go slowly, and she was rather surprised when the porter came in, and said that her car had come for her. After that she sat for another ten minutes, and then in a mixture of feverish impatience and regret that nothing now lay between her and her desire, she went out of the revolving doors, and Boyton, loquacious and important, took her to her motor. She saw the last of him, a compact, tame little man, standing on the edge of the pavement, and already greeting a friend who succeeded her in the revolving cage.
The car slid eastwards; there was but little traffic going in her direction, for all the theatres were pouring out westwards, and she hummed along past one continuous queue of carriages. Arc lights and incandescent gas brightly illuminated the crowded pavements, and she never had felt a closer kinship with the seekers of pleasure and the couples who had found it. Here and there only was a solitary figure, some man pursuing his puritanical way, or some woman, a little old perhaps to rank herself still among the daughters of joy, fluttering anxiously and uneasily on the edge of the pavement, in search of any who appreciated the charms of maturity. But for the most part there was little anxiety in evidence; it was a singularly gay assemblage that strolled and lounged, and clustered like bees round the islands in the street and to the steps of crowded buses. In the Circus some news was being called, and papers were selling rapidly; the news-boards announced the result of a cricket match.
After leaving Leicester Square the streets lost something of their illumination and their crowds, and as her motor passed up Long Acre she went, so to speak, key in hand to the locked door in her mind, where since yesterday she had imprisoned the thoughts that were concerned with to-night. They clamoured and rapped within, but she did not let them out till on approaching the opera house she called an order to her chauffeur to turn down the street in which lay the entrance to the Royal box and the stage-door. Several Royal carriages were standing in the road, the third of them being opposite the stage-door. She went past them, turned and came back again to the end of the short queue and stopped. Her footman got down and stood on the pavement close to the stage-door, a few yards in front of her motor.
She turned the key and out poured the exulting crowd of imprisoned thought. She could just see her servant standing by the stage-door, and knew that before many minutes were over she would see him touch his hat and come back with the man she was waiting for. He would open the motor door, and she would turn back the light rug that covered her knees. There would be a word of formal greeting, and he would get in. She would not need to tell the footman where to go, and presently they would move off. Beneath the rug she would feel his hand grasp hers, and that purring voice would say something. There would be miles of gas-lit streets to traverse, and after that the long, grey riband of the road lying straight between its dusky hedges. There would be silent villages lying along the valley of the river, and presently the climb up the downs, to where the woods of Grote met over the road, forming a tunnel of greenery. The lodge gate would open and close behind them, and presently they would stop beneath the Ionic pillars of the portico. They would sup together, and she would tell the servants that no one need sit up....
Somehow her mind reproduced no other pictures than these concerned with material minutiæ. What would they talk about as they drove? She had no idea; among all the liberated prisoners there was not one who had imagined that. Perhaps, who knew, they would not talk at all; perhaps he would sing, below his breath, little phrases of the love-duet. No doubt at supper, when the servants were there, they would talk; she would ask him how the opera went, whether Borinski was more ponderous than usual; perhaps she would give Geoffrey Bellingham’s impression of the last act. Then supper would be over, and they would be alone again....
She had no idea how time was going, but presently her chauffeur, who had stopped his engines, started them again, and they moved up to opposite the stage-door, and she saw that the Royal carriages had gone. The opera was therefore over, and soon the dark, narrow street became flooded with the audience from the upper part of the house, and she heard fragments of their conversation as they passed her open window.
One said: “I didn’t think much of Tristan; not a patch on Kuhlmann, was he?” That made her smile, since it was Kuhlmann that the discontented listener had just been hearing. Borinski came in for eulogy; the orchestra was admirable, but once again Tristan seemed not to have given satisfaction. Perhaps he had not sung as magnificently as usual; he had told her before now that even singing in Tristan did not absorb him, if his mind was busy with something else. The explanation thrilled her....
Gradually the crowd drained off again, and left the street empty once more. Several other motors had come up behind her, and before long she saw Borinski come out talking voluble German to her maid, who carried a bag. They got into some motor behind and drove off. Then the stage-door grew populous; a group of men came out together, also talking German; probably they were the chorus of sailors. Then came others, and, finally, there came Brangaene, whom Lady Grote knew, but did not care about knowing at this particular moment, and so, to escape recognition, she leant back in the darkness of her motor.
She applauded Kuhlmann for his discretion in letting the others get away first; certainly it was a thing better to be avoided that he should be seen getting into her motor at the stage-door. It was kind and thoughtful of him. But there was no longer any reason that he should delay his exit. She turned up the light for a moment and saw that her clock pointed to half-past twelve.
From inside the lit passage there came quick steps, and the light was put out. Next moment some theatre official, in uniform, appeared at the entrance, and proceeded to shut the door. She called her footman.