“Wednesday, like ‘Captain Salvador’ was to. Honest, Mr. Bernamer, this is hell!”
Gurdy drove off to a restaurant for dinner and here a critic stopped him on the sill to ask whether Mark had gone “quite, quite mad?” Monday was barren anguish, watching Mark’s face. “Captain Salvador” would play in Hartford and Providence all week. On Tuesday there was a rehearsal of “Todgers Intrudes” and Gurdy found a black motor initialed C. B. when he came to the Walling. Workmen were polishing the brass of the outer doors and the programs for tomorrow night were ready. Everything was ready for the sick farce. On Wednesday morning Mark ate breakfast with heroic grins and talked of playing golf in the afternoon. But he hadn’t slept well. His eyes were flecked with red. Bone showed under his cheeks. His black had an air of candid mourning.
“The best joke’d be if the damned thing made a hit,” he said.
“I think that would be a little too ironical,” Gurdy snapped.
“This is what you’d call ironical, ain’t it? Well, I’m going down to the office for a minute. Don’t come. Send for the horses and we’ll go riding about eleven.”
He walked to the Walling, was halted a dozen times and found the antechamber full of people. Some had appointments. He sat talking for an hour and then started downstairs. But he saw Cosmo Rand on the white floor of the vestibule, slim in a grey furred coat, reading a newspaper. The blue walls of the stair seemed to press Mark’s head. He turned back into the office and sent for his house manager. When the man came Mark said, “I’m not going to be here tonight, Billy. Tell anybody that asks I’m sick as a dog and couldn’t come.”
“All right. Say, sir, would you mind telling me just why—”
Mark beamed across the desk and lied, “Why, this fellow Dufford that wrote this is a friend of mine and he’s poor as a churchmouse. I thought I’d take a chance.”
The manager shuffled and blurted, “It’s a damn poor chance.”
“Mighty poor, Billy. Well, the show business is a gamble, anyhow.”