In the middle of this hot, excitedly-talking audience, they seemed to bask as in a warm pool of brilliant light. The brilliants in the dome of the theatre intensified all the shadows, heightened all the smiles, illumined all the silken blouses and silver bangles, the flashing eyes, the general air of fjte.
“All right?” Alf inquired protectively. Emmy looked in gratitude towards him.
“Lovely,” she said. “Have another?”
“I meant you,” he persisted. “Yourself, I mean.” Emmy smiled, so happily that nobody could have been unmoved at the knowledge of having given such pleasure.
“Oh, grand!” Emmy said. Then her eyes contracted. Memory came to her. The angry scene that had passed earlier returned to her mind, hurting her, and injuring her happiness. Alf hurried to engage her attention, to distract her from thoughts that had in them such discomfort as she so quickly showed.
“Like the play? I didn’t quite follow what it was this old general had done to him. Did you?”
“Hadn’t he kept him from marrying ...” Emmy looked conscious for a moment. “Marrying the right girl? I didn’t understand it either. It’s only a play.”
“Of course,” Alf agreed. “See how that girl’s eyes shone when old fur-coat went after her? Fair shone, they did. Like lamps. They’d got the limes on her... You couldn’t see them. My—er—my friend’s the electrician here. He says it drives him nearly crazy, the way he has to follow her about in the third act. She... she’s got some pluck, he says; the way she fights three of them single-handed. They’ve all got revolvers. She’s got one; but it’s not loaded. Lights a cigarette, too, with them all watching her, ready to rush at her.”
“There!” said Emmy, admiringly. She was thinking: “It’s only a play.”
“She gets hold of his fur coat, and puts it on.... Imitates his voice.... You can see it’s her all the time, you know. So could they, if they looked a bit nearer. However, they don’t.... I suppose there wouldn’t be any play if they did....”