Martha did not look at him. "No," she replied simply.
Gordon drew in his breath quickly, and the concentrated anger seemed almost ready to burst its bonds. He stood looking at her intently for a moment, then apparently realizing that he was unable to alter her decision, he threw up his hands with a despairing gesture and started toward the door.
"There will be no performance, Weldon," he said roughly. "Dismiss the audience, pay everybody their salaries, and wind up the whole cursed business. I have sunk twenty thousand dollars for a hobby and a pretty face, but now, thank God, I'm through. I'm cured. That's all—good-night."
"One moment before you go," cried Martha, stung to the quick. "You may have dazzled other girls before with your golden shower. You may have rung up curtains on success, and claimed your reckoning, but this time, even though you have brought me failure and humiliation, you may mark one failure for yourself. Good-night." And with a proud gesture of independence, she turned her back upon him, and went into her dressing-room, while Gordon, with a muttered exclamation, left the green-room for the front of the theater.
As quickly as possible the despairing Weldon gave the necessary orders. The moment the players understood there would be no performance, pandemonium broke loose. In an instant the green-room was filled with a crowd of excited players in oddly contrasting costumes, all chattering away for dear life.
"No performance?" cried Flossie Forsythe. "What does it all mean?"
"Ain't I ever going to play a real part?" wailed Pinkie.
"My first time on Broadway, too," said Arthur Mortimer, sadly.
"I never heard of such an outrageous proceeding," shouted Arnold Lawrence, pompously. "No performance, indeed? I was engaged for the season, and I shall sue for a season's salary."
"You were engaged for the run of the play," retorted Weldon, indignantly. "If the play doesn't have a run you are entitled to nothing, but I give you and every one else two weeks' salary."