Chapter XVII
Mrs. Craig Fontaine’s box was in the lower grand tier in that favored circle which, in the present struggle for social supremacy, is the ultimate battlefield. Her entrance was one of the six important arrivals of the night which affected the immense audience with a curiosity only less intense than the entrance of the prima donna. Mrs. Fontaine, approaching the curtain that shut out the swimming vision of faces, took a preparatory glance, and as the row of boxes still showed a profusion of gaps, she delayed their entrance on the pretext of waiting for Mrs. Kildair. Besides Gunther and Beecher, there were in the party Lady Fitzhugh Mowbray, a young woman of the striking English blonde type, and the Duke de Taleza-Corti, of the royal house of Italy, a cosmopolite, dry, frail in body, affecting the English monocle, with a perpetual introspective smile on his keen lips.
The absence of Mrs. Kildair had left Mrs. Fontaine in very bad humor. Not only did she consider an invitation to her box as a sort of royal command that should take precedence over all calamities, and render accidents impossible, but she felt that she would miss the effect which her well-balanced party had promised. Fortunately, at that moment the door opened and Mrs. Kildair entered.
“My dear Mrs. Fontaine,” she said immediately, in a voice that could not be heard by the rest, “the explanation I sent you is not true. It was not a question of a break-down. There are crises in our lives that cannot be put off. I can tell you no more than this, but I know you will understand that nothing except a matter of supreme importance would ever make me miss an invitation of yours.”
Mrs. Fontaine looked at her and, seeing beyond the surface calm the fires of a profound agitation, was pleased that Mrs. Kildair had not sought an easy excuse, but had thrown herself on her woman’s generosity. Also she perceived that she was strikingly dressed in a robe of that luminous, elusive green that breaks forth in the flickering driftwood, subdued and given distance by a network of black lace. It was exactly the contrast that she would have chosen as a foil to her own costume. She smiled, pressed her guest’s hand sympathetically and signaled to Gunther, who removed her wrap.
Mrs. Kildair murmured an involuntary tribute while the Duke de Taleza-Corti, with the over-frank admiration which the Latin permits, said point blank:
“If I am to sit behind you, Madame, you must bandage my eyes.”
Mrs. Fontaine had chosen the one color which, above all others, seemed to have been created to frame her dark imperious beauty—a warm purple, the tone of autumn itself, which gave to her shoulders and throat the softness of ivory. About her neck was a double string of pearls which were worth ten times the receipts of the house.
“Let’s go in,” she said, glancing at Gunther with a hope that she might find his eyes a little troubled. She signed to him to take the seat behind hers, placing Beecher back of Mrs. Kildair, and while the rest of her party immediately swept the house with their opera-glasses, she remained quiet, conscious of the sudden focus, unwilling to show herself curious of other women.
“Look,” said Mrs. Kildair to Beecher in a low aside; “Mrs. Bloodgood is in her box. What daring!” she added after a moment’s examination. “She has dressed herself in black.”
Beecher, following her directions, beheld Mrs. Bloodgood, without a single jewel or a relieving touch of color, sitting proudly, looking fixedly at the stage, disdainful of the stir and gossip which her dramatic appearance occasioned. Behind in the crowded box Mr. Bloodgood was standing, smiling and contented, showing himself with a malicious enjoyment.
“How can she do it?” he said.
“After the first act,” said Mrs. Kildair, with a sudden impulse of generosity, “go and see her. Take Mr. Gunther. It will give her strength.”
“It is decidedly brilliant,” said Lady Mowbray. “The parterre is much more effective than Covent Garden.”
“There should be a guide to tell us all the histories of these boxes,” said Taleza-Corti, with his keen perception of values. “The opera is the record of society. The history of America for the next twenty years will be written here by those who descend from the galleries into the orchestra, and those who force their way from the orchestra into the boxes. I like to think of your millionaires who might have begun up there under the roof. Fonda, our great novelist, says that the opera is the city reduced to the terms of the village. It always impresses me. Magnificent!”
No one listened to him. The women nodded from time to time as their glasses encountered those of acquaintances; Beecher, troubled at a figure which he had half perceived in the orchestra and which he sought to distinguish, fancied a resemblance to Nan Charters; Gunther, bored by a spectacle which had no novelty for him, watched Mrs. Kildair, noting the nervous hands and the occasional quickly taken breaths, asking himself what had been the real cause of her absence, half divining in a confused way the truth.
Mrs. Fontaine was languidly curious of those who had a right to her interest. She was in her element—jealous of this multitude as an actress, pleased at the fine effect she had produced. And in her triumph she was recalled to the one thing she desired to complete her ambition, to give her that command of this assemblage which she was forced to acknowledge to another. Her glance went to the box in the middle of the horseshoe, as it did covetously each night.
“Your father isn’t here tonight,” she said to Bruce Gunther with a little surprise.
“No. There is some big pow-wow on,” he answered.
Mrs. Kildair took up her glasses suddenly, turning them haphazard. The remark revived in her all the agitation of the afternoon.
“I shall never be able to sit through this,” she said to herself, leaning forward. “If I only knew—”
Mrs. Fontaine, could she have known the thoughts that were galloping through the brain of her guest, would have been astounded at their similarity. Mrs. Kildair, too, had her ambitions, ambitions as passionately held and nourished on one hope. The interview that afternoon with Slade, an interview in which for the first time she had made him feel the need of her, had all at once brought the prize within her grasp. If he could but emerge from this one supreme danger, she said to herself that she had at last the opportunity to rate herself here among the leaders of this society which she coveted, had always coveted and would never cease to covet.
“Give me Slade and twenty millions even,” she said to herself with a great intaking of breath, “and I can do anything. I will dominate this in five years.” But the more violently burned the fire of her desire, the more weak and faltering was her hope. “Ah, will he win out—can he—how is it possible?” she said bitterly. “Oh, what a gamble it all is—and I must sit here—continue to sit here like a stone—while in an hour it may all be decided!”
“You’ve seen Fornez in Carmen?” said Taleza-Corti to Gunther. “Very fine.”
“First appearance here,” said Gunther briefly. He touched Beecher on the arm. “Friends of yours over there, Ted.”
“Who?”
“The Cheevers—little to your right—row above. Hello,” he added suddenly. “See who’s with them?”
“Who?” said Beecher, who did not recognize the rest of the party.
Gunther placed his finger on his lips, with a warning glance at Mrs. Kildair, and then, bending forward, said:
“I say, Mrs. Kildair, who is that tall, rather black chap in the box with the Stanley Cheevers? He’s looking this way now.”
Mrs. Kildair raised her glasses.
“Mr. Mapleson,” she said directly.
“He’s the head of Sontag & Company, the jewelers, isn’t he?”
“Yes, I believe so.”
“Queer looking chap—ever know him?”
“Yes. Why?”
She turned, looking at the questioner with a fixity that told him she was not entirely ignorant of his real interest.
“He must have been in Paris when you were,” he said quickly. “I hear he had quite a career there.”
She turned away with indifference, gazed once more through her glasses and said:
“Yes, there were quite a number of stories about his rise. He is a man with a genius for friendships.”
“Rather attentive to Mrs. Cheever, isn’t he?” persisted Gunther.
“I didn’t know it.”
Beecher did not then seize the drift of the inquiry, still absorbed as he was in the attempt to gain a clearer view of the profile in the orchestra which reminded him of Nan Charters. Lady Mowbray continued silent, busy as a true Briton in the search for the ridiculous in this assemblage which at first glance had impressed her.
All at once the lights went out and the first act was on. The entrance of Emma Fornez was eagerly awaited as a new sensation to an audience which yearly must be served with the novel and startling. It had been rumored that her impersonation was even a bit shocking, and the house, stirred by the expectation, waited hopefully. At the end of the act opinions were divided: the galleries applauded frantically, moved by the sure magnetism of a great artist, but the boxes and most of the orchestra waited undecided, each afraid to be the leader.
“But I don’t see anything shocking at all,” said the voice of a young woman in the next box, a note of complaint in her voice.
“Wait—it’s in the second act,” answered the sarcastic note of a man.
“Ah, the love scene,” said the woman mollified.
The two young men rose, giving their places to arriving visitors, and went into the corridors on their rounds. Beecher was thoughtful. He had at last assured himself that he had not been mistaken—Miss Charters was present. He had detected her with her glasses on his box, but he had not succeeded in seeing who was her companion.
“I’d give a good deal to know how well Mrs. Cheever knows Mapleson,” said Gunther eagerly.
“I say, what do you mean by poking me?” asked Beecher suddenly.
“Didn’t you get on? Mapleson is the head of Sontag & Company; Sontag & Company sold the ring to Slade. Now if Mapleson and Mrs. Cheever are intimate it’s possible—just a chance—Mrs. Cheever may have known the facts. See?”
Beecher shrugged his shoulders.
“It’s a long shot.”
“But a chance. I’ll pick up some one here in five minutes who can tell me.”
Beecher entered the Bloodgood box and, making his way to the front, gave his hand to Mrs. Bloodgood. Four or five men, impelled by curiosity, were before him, mentally registering their reports to add to the fund of gossip. Mrs. Bloodgood, glad to avail herself of the opportunity, had turned her back on the audience and was holding her head against these social scouts, who discussed Slade, which was a manner of discussing Majendie.
She welcomed Beecher’s arrival as that of an ally and made him the pretext of withdrawing from the general conversation. The moment he looked at her, he had the tact to perceive that any display of sympathy would be an offense. There was no trace left of the weak and desperate woman. Instead, he was aware of an immense change in her, a transformation that was moral, and looking into her eyes he could not realize that he had ever seen them weep.
“They’ll force out Slade,” said a voice.
“Where are you tonight?” she asked quietly.
“In Mrs. Craig Fontaine’s box,” he said.
“Mrs. Kildair is there, isn’t she?”
“Yes.” He hesitated, but did not deliver her message. The woman before him asked compassion from no one. In the commotion at his side he caught a phrase: “Wonder if Slade will kill himself too?”
“Do you like Fornez?” he said hastily, and despite himself he looked into her eyes to see what effect the remark had made.
“Very much,” she said coldly, a little staccato. And then calmly, to end a subject that was disagreeable to her, she turned to the other. “Fornez has made a success, don’t you think?”
Beecher left presently, oppressed by the hardness that he felt in her.
“There’s a woman who will never have any pity,” he thought as he left. Mr. Bloodgood, who remembered him with a malicious smile, shook his hand with extra cordiality.
“Did you give my message?” asked Mrs. Kildair as he took his place.
“It was wiser not,” he said. Then all at once, struck by the fatigue in her face, he asked anxiously: “Are you very tired?”
“Yes, very,” she said.
In this box, too, nothing had been spoken of except the drama, which at that moment was centered about John G. Slade. As nothing could possibly be known, every one arrived with a fresh rumor, and the burden of all was the annihilation of the Westerner. The sudden darkness came to her as a relief. She relaxed wearily in her chair and forced her mind to forget itself in the sudden access of gaiety from the stage.
This second act was a veritable triumph for Emma Fornez. In the scene of Don Jose’s return she acted with such fine and natural primitive passion that all the constricted little feminine natures in the audience were stirred by the pulsing exhibition of an emotion they had carefully choked or reduced to mathematics, and, really moved, trembling in their imprisoned bodies, they applauded for the first time. Then suddenly they ceased—a little ashamed.
In descending the stairway to go behind the stage, Beecher perceived Miss Charters in the distance of the shifting crowd. He stopped, by a movement he did not analyze, to speak to a purely chance acquaintance, hoping that she would perceive him. Then he continued to the dressing-room of the prima donna.
Emma Fornez was in a state of frenzied delight.
“I have them, Teddy—I have them! Is it not so?” she cried, clapping her hands together as a child. She flung her arms about him, embracing him. In fact, she embraced every one—even Victorine, her maid.
“The house is wild with enthusiasm,” he said, laughing.
“Aha! I made them sit up, didn’t I—your cold women! It’s the second act, Teddy—the second—you get them there. Bah! They don’t even know what I did to them.” All at once she stopped, seriously assuming a countenance of terror. “Oh, but the critics—what will the monsters say! They never like it when the audience is too enthusiastic.”
“I saw Macklin applauding, Madame,” said Spinetti, putting his head into the room.
“Angel!” cried Emma Fornez, and she embraced Spinetti. Then, knowing in herself that the day was won, she began to amuse her audience. “Do you know what the critics will write? I’ll tell you. The audience was carried off its feet in the second act. They will praise the first. They will say the second was obvious, and they will praise the third act, because there I shall do a little trick to them—in the card scene. I shall be very noble—very tragic. I will make a little picture of death before my eyes—with all his bones rattling and his great big hollow eyes, and they shall see it on my face—so! And I’ll look very steady—noble—profound—like a queen. See?—a thing which Carmen would nevère, nevère do, for she’s a little wretch of an animal that would be frightened to death. But you will see they will all like it—it’s their moral that you have to serve up to them.”
“Third act—third act,” came the running call from the flies. “All on the stage for the third act.”
When Beecher entered the corridor, Miss Charters was only a short distance away. He was prepared for Lorraine as a companion, but he felt a sudden anger at the sight of Garraboy, who in turn, suddenly comprehending the aim of his partner’s maneuvers, looked anything but pleased.
She nodded to him, holding out her hand.
“She is wonderful, Teddy, wonderful. Have you seen her? Is she pleased?”
“She is a great, great artist,” he said with extra warmth. “She is pleased as a child.”
The two men had nodded with that impertinent jerk of the head which in society conveys the effect of a bucket of water.
“Come and see me after the next act,” she said, looking at him closely.
“If I can,” he said hastily.
He went up the steps and from the tail of his eye saw her linger, watching him as he went. A little contrition, a sudden sympathy came to him, but he repressed it angrily, saying to himself between his teeth:
“Garraboy—how can she stand for that!”
When he returned to the box, Mrs. Kildair and Mrs. Fontaine were in the anteroom in low converse. He was suddenly struck with the look of age in Mrs. Kildair’s face.
“But I assure you—I can go alone,” she was saying.
“I would not allow it,” said Mrs. Fontaine firmly. Then turning to Beecher she said, so as not to reach the others: “Teddy, as soon as the curtain is up, step out. Mrs. Kildair is not well. You will take her home. I have ordered the automobile. You can get back for the last act.”
Mrs. Kildair made no further remonstrance—she was at the end of her tether.
“Sit here,” she said to Beecher, sitting down on the couch. “I don’t want to be noticed.”
“You’re ill!” he said alarmed.
“Yes, ill,” she said mechanically.
At this moment the house became still. She rose with a return of energy and signaled him that she was ready. Five minutes later they were in the automobile fleeing uptown.
A moment of weakness was rare in her life, yet she comprehended it without seeking to delude herself.
“At twenty I should not even have trembled,” she said to herself, sinking back into the cushioned seat and watching the lights of the streets flash past the window with a comforting emotion of speed. “Now it is different. Every life has one supreme opportunity—this is mine. I know it.”
Had a woman been at her side instead of Beecher, she would have given her confidence in the terrible necessity for sharing the emotion that was too vital to her. As it was, she restrained herself, remaining silent by a last effort of her will, but her hand on the window-frame began a nervous syncopated beating, imitating the click of the fleeing rails which one hears on a railroad train.
“You are feeling better?” said the young man in a troubled voice.
“Open the window—just for a moment,” she answered.
The sudden blast of cold air, damp as though laden with the tears of the city, terrified her with its suggestion of despair and defeat.
“No, no, shut it!” she said hurriedly.
He obeyed and then to distract her, began:
“I received your note, Rita, just before coming, McKenna—”
“No, no,” she said, interrupting him, “that is nothing. Just let me be quiet a moment—get hold of myself.”
But in a few moments she was forced to seek the stimulus of the air again, and she cried hurriedly, not concealing her agitation:
“Open, open quick!”
The crisis which she felt approaching with every block which fell behind was so immense, the stake so ardently coveted, so weakly feared, that she had in the last eternal waiting moments a sensation of vertigo, that swept down and seized her even as on the football field before the blowing of the whistle the stanchest player feels his heart lying before him on the ground. She opened her lips, drinking in the chill, revivifying draught, unaware of the strange impression her disordered countenance in the embrasure of the window made on the occasional passers-by.
“Better first in a village than second in Rome.”
She found herself repeating the saying mechanically, without quite understanding how it had so suddenly leaped into her mind. Then, as the automobile turned into her street, and she felt that he was there waiting as he had promised, successful or ruined; that now in ten minutes all would be over, she would know; all at once, without that sense of humor which deserts us in great stress, she began to pray confusedly to some one immense, whom she had never understood, but one who seemed to hold all fates in the balancing of his fingers.
“Are you better? What shall I do? Shall I come up with you?” asked Beecher, totally in the dark.
“No, no—wait,” she said hurriedly, as the machine ground to a stop. She did not rise at once, stiffening in her seat, grasping the arm of the young man until he winced under the contraction of her fingers.
“Good!” she said suddenly; and before he could prevent her she was out on the sidewalk. “No, no; stay in. Thanks, thanks a thousand times. I’ll send you back.”
Before he could protest, she shut the door firmly and nodded to the chauffeur.
The elevator boy was already at the swinging glass doors, holding them open for her entrance.
“Mr. Slade here, Jo?” she said instantly.
“Yes, ma’am; upstairs.”
“How long?”
“About half an hour.”
She entered the elevator and descended at the landing, waiting until it had disappeared.
“Now for it!” she said, pressing the bell. And by a last display of her will, she sent through her body a wave of cold resolution that left her outwardly impassive with a little touch of scorn on her lips.