“Her latest investment isn’t a bad notion, but Kit is working the scheme for all it’s worth. Anybody but the newest of the new would see through the game.”
The other laughed gratingly.
“‘New’ is a mild way of putting it. We call her ‘Kit’s windfall’ at our Club. Madame’s disciple had, as she fondly imagined, netted a couple of veritable musical lions, and ten people were invited to hear their after-dinner roar. The very day before the feast the male lion fell sick, and the lioness wouldn’t or couldn’t leave her mate. Kitty was tearing her false bang over the note apprising her of the disaster when a card was brought in, telling her that an old schoolmate who had been educated as a music-teacher, and had a niceish talent for recitation, had removed to the city. Kit caught at the straw; raced around to inspect her, judged her to be more than eligible, and roped her in. Delorme was at the dinner and told me the story, which his wife had from Kit’s own lips. The new ‘find’ had beauty as well as a voice and a taste for theatricals, and a neat income, so Kit says—some thirty thousand a year. Moreover, she is tremendously grateful for the lift in the world, and so daft with enjoyment of her first glimpse of le bon ton that she would send Kit ten out of the thirty thousand sooner than lose her social standing. She doesn’t guess that she will be tossed aside like a squeezed orange next year, poor thing!”
Arthur leaned against the door-frame, too giddy and sick to move, had action been practicable in such a press. One of the tedious “waits” inseparable from amateur performances gave every woman there a chance to outscream her neighbor. It might be dishonorable not to make himself known to the gossips who considered themselves absolved by the payment of an entrance fee from the obligation to speak well, or not at all, of their hosts. He did not put the question to himself whether or not he should continue to listen. In a judicial mood he would have weighed the pros and cons of fact or fiction in the tale he had heard. Every word had, to his consciousness, the stamp of authenticity. In the shock of the confirmation of his worst misgivings with regard to his wife’s chosen intimate, his ruling thought was of the anguish the truth would cause her. How best to lessen the shock to her tender, loving heart, how to mitigate her mortification, began already to put his deliberate faculties upon the strain.
The wiry falsetto and wheezy laugh struck in from his very elbow.
“Kit’s exemplary spouse may not share her pecuniary profits, but he has an eye to innings of another sort. I met him at the Club last night, and saw that he had about six champagnes and four cocktails more than his brain could balance. An hour later, I was passing the house of our pretty prima donna when a carriage drew up and out stepped Jack and turned to help out his wife’s favorite. And, by Jove! the way he did it was to put his arm about her waist, swing her to the side-walk and try to kiss her! She espied me, I suppose, for she broke away from him with a little screech, and flew up her steps like a lapwing. She must have had her latchkey all ready, for she got the door open in a twinkling, and slammed it. I guffawed outright, and didn’t Jack swear!”
“What a beastly cad he is!” said the deep voice disgustfully.
Few men in the circumstances would have kept so forcibly in mind the shame to wife and children that would follow a blow and quarrel then and there, as the commonplace husband upon whose ear and heart every vile word had fallen like liquid fire. He rent a path through the throng, got his hat and coat and went out of the abhorrent place. He had seen to it that Susie’s hired carriage was always driven by the same man—a steady, middle-aged American—and recognizing him upon the box, signaled him to draw up to the sidewalk, stepped into the vehicle, and prepared to wait as patiently as might be until the man’s number should be called by the attendant policeman.
The “show” was not over for an hour longer, and his carriage was the last called. The fair manager had detained her lieutenant to exchange felicitations over the triumph of the evening. Susie appeared, finally, running down the steps so fast that her attendant only overtook her at the curbstone. He had come out bareheaded, and without other protection against the bitter March wind than his evening dress and thin shoes. Mrs. Cornell’s hand was on the handle of the carriage door, and he covered it with his own.
“Are you cruel or coquettish, sweet Annie Laurie?” he asked in accents thickened by liquor and laughter.