But there was much more to tell, and Mrs. Thrale took very good care to abate nothing of her narrative; it gave her so good a chance of acting, and it gave Mr. Garrick so good a chance of complimenting her before all the company.
“Oh, I vow that we played our parts to perfection,” she cried, “and without any rehearsal either. But then what happened? You will scarce believe it, Mr. Garrick has always borne such a character for scrupulous honour in his dealings with his companies, but indeed 'tis a fact that our manager decamped as soon as he found that the poor man had been teased to the verge of madness by the fooling he had started—off he went, we knew not whither; leaving no message for any of us. He was not to be found by noon; and what happened by dinner-time? Why, the poor gentleman whom we had been fooling had also fled!”
“That was indeed too bad of Mr. Kendal,” said Dr. Burney.
“'Twas too inconsiderate of him truly,” cried Mrs. Thrale. “'Tis no great matter if the manager of the playhouse runs away when his play is produced—you remember that Mr. Colman hurried off to Bath to escape lampooners when the success of Dr. Goldsmith's comedy She Stoops to Conquer had proved to all the town that he was no judge of a play; but for the one who has been made the object of such a jest as ours to escape without giving us a chance of bringing our teasing to a fitting climax is surely little short of infamous.”
“And when did you design the fitting climax to arrive, madam?” asked one of the circle.
“Why, when the gentleman and lady should come face to face in the Assembly Rooms, to be sure,” replied Mrs. Thrale. “We were all there to await the scene of their meeting; and you can judge of our chagrin when only the lady appeared.”
“We can do so, indeed,” said Mrs. Darner, who was also in the circle. “I can well believe that you were furious. When one has arranged a burletta for two characters 'tis infamous when only one of the actors appears on the stage.”
Mrs. Thrale smiled the smile of the lady who knows that she is harbouring a surprise for her friends and only awaits the right moment to spring it upon them—a cat to be let out of the bag at the pulling of a string.
“I knew that we should have your sympathy, Mrs. Darner,” she said demurely. “You have, I doubt not, more than once experienced all the chagrin that follows the miscarrying of a well-planned scheme. But as it so happened, we were more than compensated for our ill-usage at that time by the unlooked-for appearance of the missing actor two nights later.”
“Oh, lud!” cried Mrs. Darner, holding up both her hands in a very dainty way.