“And do you mean that you would go back on that understanding?”
“And do you mean that you expect me to see this money wasted and the play sent to pot?”
Thyrsis, in his agony, turned to Miss Lewis. “Will you let him break our bargain?” he cried.
“But what else is there to be done?” she answered.
“Don’t you see that the play is a failure? And don’t you see the plight you’ve got me in?”
Thyrsis was dumb with dismay. He stared from one of these people to another, and his heart went down—down. He saw that his case was hopeless. He had no one to help him or to advise him, and he had less than eleven dollars in his pocket.
“What do you propose to do?” he asked, weakly.
“I have already telegraphed to Richard Haberton,” said Jones. “He will meet us and see the next two performances; and then we’ll lay the company off until we get some kind of a practical play.”
And so the steam-roller rolled and the matter was settled; and Thyrsis, broken-hearted, bid the trio farewell, and took an early train back to New York.
He never saw any member of the company again—and he never saw the “practical play” which Mr. Richard Haberton made out of “The Genius”. What was done he gathered from the press-clippings that came to him—the famous author of “The Rajah’s Diamond” caused Helena to fall into Lloyd’s arms at the end of the second act, and had them safely if not happily married at the beginning of the third. Also he wrote several “charming” scenes for Ethelynda Lewis, and two weeks later the play had a second opening in another manufacturing town of New England—where the critics, awed by the name of the distinguished dramatist upon the play-bills, were moved to faint praise. But perhaps it was that Mr. Richard Haberton required more than two weeks’ time for the evolving of real “charm”; at any rate the audience came in no larger numbers to see this new version, and the misbegotten production lived for another six performances, and died a peaceful death at the very gates of the metropolis.