Jerome couldn’t wait till morning to break the news to Curry, but got the impresario out of bed. There were new lines of worry and care in the good man’s face, but his enthusiasm over the offer which had been made his erstwhile business manager was wholly unfettered. At first he blinked sleepily, and said: “Well—well....” in a somewhat solemn, deliberating way. But when he woke up sufficiently to realize that it wasn’t for advice but for congratulation that the business manager had roused him, then Curry became satisfactorily boisterous. In fact, they both became a little boisterous, for Jerome had smuggled in sandwiches and a bottle of something, and insisted upon an impromptu celebration right on the spot.
It was well along toward morning before the weary maestro was left to a little snatch of needed slumber. As for Jerome, he didn’t go to bed at all. He felt it would be out of the question even to think of bed. And he wanted to be on hand early to corner Lili with the facts and give her, he told himself, some general instructions. He whistled along the waterfront, deserted and very full of echoes at this hour, and finally settled down on a barrel of tar to wait for sun-up.
Jerome had scarcely seen Lili since the arrival in Borneo—and had, indeed, given her deliberately a wide berth. It was essential, he felt, to begin making it plain to all the world that they weren’t living together any more. Now he began wondering how she was making out, and what she had been up to. Poor Lili, he thought. She seemed so helpless, so little able to look out for herself. He must see what could be done. Perhaps he could arrange to send her part of his salary for awhile. He would see how reasonably she took the news of his desertion.
The songbirds began to appear, clad in outlandish togs which had been acquired helter-skelter in a mart where there was little in the way of choice. They were all in good spirits, however. “On to Yokohama!” had been adopted as the company slogan. After that—well, no one seemed to care to bother very much yet about the future. Things would turn up, as they always did, somehow or other.
Jerome was just deciding that happy-go-lucky Lili had overslept, as she so frequently did, and debated ascertaining her lodgings and going off to hunt her up, when suddenly he beheld her coming along, garbed in a queer pink dress and wearing an enormous hat trimmed with blue roses and fur. She had a little white dog on a leash, and it strained sniffingly ahead, running in a spindle-legged, sidling manner. She was right upon Jerome before she discovered him.
“Oh, Jerry!” she cried. And at first her eyes beamed with the sheer pleasure of encountering him; but almost at once they took on a hurt, reproachful look, and all the beam was gone out of them. Her lips went into a disappointed little pout.
He wasted no words, but acquainted her simply and frankly with the facts in the case. Their ways were to sever. Tomorrow at this hour they would be hundreds of miles apart. It was unlikely they would ever meet again.
“Oh, but Jerry....” she faltered.
“It’s up to you,” he concluded, “to do the rest. They know we’ve not been getting on. Now it will be very easy. You may tell them anything you like. I don’t care how strong you make your case—I guess I can stand up under the strain. But I should think that simple desertion would be about as good as anything. Just one request: Please don’t tell them I was in the habit of hitting you with clubs. I’d hate any one to think that of me. But I know you’ll work it out. And if you want to say I fell in love with some one else—if that would help—why, go ahead, only please have a heart and don’t make her some little painted fool. I’ve written my address on this piece of paper”—he handed it over—“and if you have trouble financing things for awhile, just get in touch with me and I’ll see what I can do, though as you know, I’m not by any means a pluto yet!”
She seemed a little bewildered by it all. As a matter of fact, it was a rather bewildering speech. And before she had quite found her bearings, Lili murmured, with tears threatening: “We were so happy together once, Jerry—oh, I could cry my eyes out at the way you’re treating me!”