"Poor Wickes is nearly beside himself," said the Duchess. "He will never get over it. But imagine my feelings when I discovered what I had done——"
"The populace at the back didn't know what to make of it; they are used to us rollicking in John Peel,—shouting out the chorus. But we were all too utterly petrified to emit a whoop——"
"Is there anything you would like in the way of properties, Mrs. Hill?" said Wickes, in a severe, sad voice. Susan looked down, suddenly nervous, her hands clenched, her face a little pale.
"What is your wife going to do?" Kilgour was asking, and Barnaby was answering carelessly that he didn't know.
"She is rather a dab at acting," he said, and now he was looking humorously at her. But for once she failed to smile back her recognition of the eternal joke between them.... Yes, she was good at acting....
"Turn the lights down," she said, and Mr. Wickes flew obediently to the nearest lamp. Anything to obliterate past misfortunes!—"And there is a woman at the back with a baby. Ask her to lend it to me."
She had meant to amuse them differently, but some impulse had made her change her mind. She flung a dark shawl, borrowed, over her satin frock. Mr. Wickes came back to her, carrying the child gingerly; its mother had relinquished it with pride, only protesting against his taking it up by the back of its neck like a puppy, which Wickes, distracted by his responsibilities, had seemed inclined to do.
They were all looking at her with interest, mildly stirred to expect something unusual, as the anxious Wickes helped her on to the platform and lowered another lamp. But as she stood above them their curious faces faded, and the touch of the little body, so light in her arm, took her out of herself. She was once more playing, playing for life, in the Tragedy Company; making the people sob at the tragic end of the drama.
"—Don't waken the child...."
The first note of her voice vibrated like the plaintive string of a harp. The listeners were startled.