"Has he anything new?" asked Charmian.
Max Elliot looked happily evasive.
"Madame Sennier says he hasn't."
"We ought to have a rival enterprise here as they have in New York at present," said Lady Mildred.
"Sennier's success at the Metropolitan has nearly killed the New Era," said Elliot. "But Crayford has any amount of pluck, and a purse that seems inexhaustible. I suppose you know he's to be here to-night."
"Mr. Jacob Crayford, the Impresario!" exclaimed Charmian. "He's in England?"
"Arrived to-day by the Lusitania in search of talent, of someone who can 'produce the goods' as he calls it. Adelaide sent a note to meet him at the Savoy, and he's coming. Shows his pluck, doesn't it? This is the enemy's camp."
Max Elliot laughed gaily. He loved the strong battles of art, backed by "commercial enterprise," and was friends with everyone though he could be such a keen and concentrated partisan.
"Crayford would give a hundred thousand dollars without a murmur to get Jacques away from the Metropolitan," he continued.
"Won't he go for that?" asked Lady Mildred, in her hollow voice. "Is Madame Sennier holding out for two hundred thousand?"