“Have you ever been in Timbuctoo,
Your fortunes to pursue there?
Sir, if you have, you doubtless know
The singular things they do there.”
“That reminds me of Lewis Carroll and my lost youth.”
“It ought to remind you of my little cousin over there. It’s hers. She’s always writing jingles like that.”
“She’s certainly a wonder. As I tried to say a bit ago, you did a gallant thing in changing parts as you did. You might have broken up the show; but we all got through in some way. Your throat’s a lot better now, isn’t it?” he added ironically. “But in seeking your own most unselfish ends you certainly played a most extraordinary trick on the audience and the poor struggling cast. Now there’s a young man standing right back of me, talking to some one whose voice I don’t identify, who must have been considerably injured by the change of stars.”
He referred to Balcomb, who was much swollen with pride by his success in the opera, and who was talking in his usual breathless fashion to a young friend from the country whom he had asked to witness his triumph. Beyond Pollock’s head Zelda could see Balcomb’s profile, though she could not hear him.
“She’s a regular piece, that girl. I was scared to death for fear she’d throw me in that duet—we’d never sung it together—but I carried it through all right. She’s that stunning Miss Dameron’s cousin. She’s rather stuck on me, I’m afraid,—I’ve done little things for her,—theater and so on, but I’ll have to cut it all out. She’s amusing, but I can’t afford to have her misunderstand my attentions. When a fellow finds that he’s got a girl down fine she ceases to be interesting. It’s the pursuit that’s amusing; but when they begin to expect something—Cunning? well, I should say!”
Pollock heard him distinctly, and he shut his eyes two or three times in a quick way that he had when angry, though he kept on talking to Zelda about the evening’s performance.