Mr. Fitzroy in his turn flushed. He had an obstinate chin and the cares of stage-management had already traced a line right across his smooth forehead. It deepened to a furrow as he leaned forward out of his low wicker chair, clutching the pair of dogskin gloves which he held in his hand.
"Oh, come, I say now, Mrs. Stewart!" and his voice and eye were surprisingly stern for one so young. "That's not playing fair. You promised me you'd see me through this show, and you know as well as I do, Mrs. Shaw can no more act than those fire-irons."
"But I—" Milly was about to say "I've never acted in my life"—when she remembered that she knew less than any one in her acquaintance what she had or had not done in that recent life which was not hers. "I shouldn't act Galatea at all well," she substituted lamely; "and I shouldn't look the part nearly as well as Mrs. Shaw will."
"Excuse me, Mrs. Stewart, but I'm certain you're simply cut out for it all round, and you told me the other day you were particularly anxious to play it. You promised you'd stick to me through thick and thin and not care a twopenny—I mean a straw—what Jim Morrison and Mrs. Shaw—"
In the stress of conversation they had neither of them noticed the tinkle of the front-door bell. Now the door of the room, narrow and in the thickness of an enormous wall, was thrown open and Mrs. Shaw was announced.
Fitzroy, forgetful of manners in his excitement, stooped forward and gripping Milly's arm almost hissed:
"Remember! You've promised me."
The words filled Milly with misery. That any one should be able to accuse her of breaking a promise, however unreal her responsibility for it, was horrible to her.
Mrs. Shaw entered, no longer the seraph of twenty months ago. She had latterly put off the æsthetic raiment she had worn with such peculiar grace, and her dress and coiffure were quite in the fashion of the hour. The transformation somewhat shocked Milly, who could never help feeling a slight austere prejudice against fashionably dressed woman. Then, considering how little she knew Mrs. Shaw, it was embarrassing to be kissed by her.
"It's odd I should find you here, Mr. Fitzroy," said Mrs. Shaw, settling her rustling skirts on a chintzy chair. "I've just come to talk to Mrs. Stewart about the acting. I'm so sorry there's been a misunderstanding about it."