The applause as the curtain descended was tumultuous. Sir Henry bowed—to the right, to the left, to the centre. He made a little speech.
'I am deeply gratified at the great welcome you have given our efforts in the service of our poet. I am proud to have had the collaboration of Mr Charles Mann, and to have had the good fortune to discover in Miss Clara Day Ariel's very self. I thank you.'
The audience clamoured for Ariel, but she did not appear. She had moved away to her dressing-room, and had torn off her sky blue and silver net. She rent them into shreds, and her dresser, who had caught the elated excitement that was running through the theatre, burst into tears.
Rodd nearly swooned with anxiety when she did not appear, and he was almost knocked over when Verschoyle, white to the lips, darted out of the box.
'Sorry, sir,' he said, and was moving on when Rodd caught him by the arm.
'Let me go, damn you,' said Verschoyle.
'I want to speak to you.'
Verschoyle recognised his man and said,—
'In God's name has anything happened?'
(Something had happened but they did not know it. In her dressing-room, half way through the performance, she had found a note:—