“So long!” Randy said, and left, but not before he had quickly placed a kiss on the back of Peggy’s neck, where it wouldn’t spoil her make-up.
XVII
S.R.O.
Peggy was writing a letter to Jean Wilson, her friend back home in Rockport, Wisconsin. She was already on the third page.
... so Paula’s parents agreed to stay out of sight until after opening night. As you can see from the clippings I’ve enclosed, the play went off wonderfully. Every paper loved us—and the whole audience, too. At the final curtain, they wouldn’t let us off! We got curtain after curtain, and I thought the applause would never stop for Paula. She got seven solo curtain calls! (I shouldn’t brag, but I got two myself.)
When Paula was handed an enormous bouquet of roses somewhere along about the third or fourth curtain call, and when she saw that the card on them was from her mother and father, I thought she was going to fly around the stage like Peter Pan! She managed to keep her head, though, and they kept out of sight in the projection booth until all the critics and everybody else had left the theater. They didn’t want Paula to think that their presence had any effect on whatever it was the critics were going to write.
I don’t think it would have mattered, anyway. When I saw Paula right after the final curtain, she said that she had lost all her silly fears, and that she didn’t even care about the reviews, because she knew for herself what she was worth. I’m glad she finally figured it out!
After it was all over, Mr. and Mrs. Andrews gave a party for the cast—and you’ll never guess where! It was at Sir Brian Alwyne’s house! It seems that they’re old friends of Sir Brian—as I told you, he’s really interested in the theater—and that explains why Paula wouldn’t go there for the audition. Sir Brian has known her since she was a child, and he knew that she was supposed to be in Europe. When she heard that the audition was to be at his home, Paula just panicked. She didn’t know what to do, so she ran.
Sir Brian was very charming to me at the party. He said that although he was pleased that Paula had played the lead, and although she had done a magnificent job, he had been looking forward to seeing me in the part. I thought it was very sweet of him.
It was a wonderful party. We stayed up almost all night, until the early editions of the papers came out, and then we sat around reading the best phrases out of each of the reviews, and repeating them to each other endlessly.
We owe a lot to Paula’s parents for getting the top critics down to see us. And we also owe them a lot for getting other people to come too. The play has been running for a week now and we’ve actually had to put up the S.R.O. sign (“standing room only,” you know). Let me tell you about a few of the good things that have happened.