“But this means that all the theatres can open again!”
“Well, maybe you’d better get to work and frame the amendment to Ordinance 147 we’ve been talking about, then. And the new statute, too. We’ve wasted too much time. But under the old one, we can’t go flirting with trouble. And if all they do is show pictures like Ben-Hur, and The Swordmaker’s Son, why ... don’t you see? We just won’t notice this thing of Henry’s. We can’t afford to act too narrow.... And I’m not cross with you any more. You were all worked up, weren’t you? I’ll excuse you. And I could just hug you for being so worked up in the interests of the 211 League. I didn’t understand.... When are you coming up to see me? I’ve been awfully lonesome––since yesterday.”
Mr. Mix hung up, and sat staring into vacancy. Out of the wild tumult of his thoughts, there arose one picture, clear and distinct––the picture of his five thousand dollar note. Whatever else happened, he couldn’t financially afford, now or in the immediate future, to break with Mirabelle. She would impale him with bankruptcy as ruthlessly as she would swat a fly; she would pursue him, in outraged pride, until he slept in his grave. And on the other hand, if certain things did happen––at the Orpheum––how could he spiritually afford to pass the remainder of his life with a militant reformer who wouldn’t even have money to sweeten her disposition––and Mr. Mix’s. He wished that he had put off until tomorrow what he had done, with such conscious foresight, only yesterday.
CHAPTER XII
Now although Mr. Mix had shaken with consternation when he saw the advertisement of the Orpheum, Henry shook with far different sentiments when he saw the announcement in eulogy of Mr. Mix. It was clear in his mind, now, that Mr. Mix wasn’t the sort of man to marry on speculation; Henry guessed that Mirabelle had confided to him the terms of the trust agreement, and that Mr. Mix (who had shaken his head, negatively, when Henry estimated his profits) had decided that Henry was out of the running, and that Mirabelle had a walkover. The guess itself was wrong, but the deduction from it was correct; and Henry was convulsed to think that Mr. Mix had shown his hand so early. And instead of gritting his teeth, and damning Mr. Mix for a conscienceless scoundrel, Henry put back his head and laughed until the tears came.
He hurried to show the paragraph to Anna, 213 but Anna wouldn’t even smile. She was a woman, and therefore she compressed her lips, sorrowfully, and said: “Oh––poor Miss Starkweather!” To which Henry responded with a much more vigorous compression of his own lips, and the apt correction: “Oh, no––poor Mr. Mix!”
He carried his congratulations to his aunt in person; she received them characteristically. “Humph!... Pretty flowery language.... Well, you don’t need to send me any present, Henry; I didn’t send you one.”
“When’s the happy event to be?” he inquired, politely.