Part 15

“No. I’ve got some pride left, son. You shan’t go near her. You go down to the farm and stay with the folks.”

Gurdy wanted nothing more. All the pressmen and underlings were puzzled by Mark’s maintenance of the English comedy on the road. It was not making money. The theatrical weeklies had warned New York how bad was “Todgers Intrudes.” Gurdy drove his motor down to Fayettesville on Saturday, had a fit of shame and hurried back on Sunday. On the face of the Walling the dead electric bulbs told the news, “Mark Walling Presents Todgers Intrudes With Cosmo Rand” and Mark’s treasurer came out of the white doors to expostulate.

“I don’t get this. Your uncle’s playin’ for a dead loss, Mr. Bernamer. It’s no damn good.”

“Where is he?”

“Went up to New Haven yesterday. ‘Captain Salvador’ played there last night. Say, what’s the idea? This ‘Todgers’ ain’t done a thing but eat up money. Every one knows it’s a frost!” The man worried openly.

There could be no explanation, Gurdy saw. The critics would jeer. Mark’s friends would chaff him. The boy patted his wheel and asked, “What night does it open?”

“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.”

Rand was gone from the vestibule. Mark walked seething over Broadway and into Sixth Avenue. He must think of something to do, tonight. He couldn’t sit at home. The flags on the Hippodrome wagged to him. He went there and bought two seats. The tickets stayed unmentioned in his pocket all the deadly afternoon. At six he said shyly to Gurdy, “Think you want to see this tonight, son?”

“Might as well, sir.”

The “sir” pleased Mark. It rang respectfully. He stammered, “I got a couple of seats for the show at the Hippodrome and--”

“That’s good,” Gurdy said, “We needn’t dress, then.”

But Mark sat haunted in the vast theatre, watching the stage. He had deserted his own, run from disaster. The Walling revenged itself. He saw the misty ceiling wane as lights lowered and the remote rims of silver mirrors fade in the corners of the gallery. The glow from the stage would show the massed shoulders of women in the black boxes. Cora Boyle would be sitting in the righthand box. She might wear a yellow gown. He would risk seeing that to be mixed in his dream. It was the best theatre of the city, of the world. He blinked at the monstrous evolutions of this chorus, peered at Gurdy and saw the boy sit moodily, knee over knee, listless from grieving, his arms locked. The time ticked on Mark’s wrist--The critics would be filing into the white vestibule where men must admire the dull blue panels of clear enamel, the simple, grooved ceiling and the hidden lamps. The yellow smoke room would be full. He wanted to be there in the face of derision. A dry aching shook Mark. It was like the past time when Gurdy first went to school or when Margot had gone to England; the Walling was his child. He had desired it beyond any woman. He adored it out of his wretchedness. He pressed his shoulder against Gurdy for the sake of warmth and Gurdy grinned loyally at him. There was no one so kind as Gurdy who began to tell silly tales when they came home and sat on Mark’s bed smoking cigarettes. In the morning the boy brought up the papers and said gruffly, “Not as bad as I thought--”

“Oh, get out! I bet they’re fierce,” Mark laughed, “Read me some.”

Gurdy dropped the damp sheets on the quilt, glared at them and dashed his hand against the foot of the bed. He cried, “I don’t give a d-damn what they say about the play! They’ve no right to talk about you like that!”

Immense warmth flooded Mark. He sat up and said, “Sure they have. For all they know I thought this thing was fine.... God bless you, son!” He wanted to do something for Gurdy directly. “Say, for heaven’s sake, brother, those clothes are too thin for winter. We’ll run down and order you some. And let’s go down to the farm. I ain’t seen dad and your mother in a dog’s age.--And hell, this ain’t so bad, Gurdy. The thing’ll dry up and blow away. We’ll bring ‘Captain Salvador’ in. I’ve had worse luck on a rabbit hunt.”

But at Fayettesville where his father asked why Margot hadn’t come to say good-bye, Mark was still plagued by visionary glimpses of the Walling, half-filled by yawning folk, the black boxes empty. The flat country was deep in moist snow. Snow had to be considered. Audiences laughed nowadays at the best paper flakes. He talked to Gurdy about it on Saturday morning.

“Pale blue canvas with the whitest light you can get jammed on it. That might work.”

“Mark, if you couldn’t have scenery for a play would you--”

Mark scoffed, “What’s a play without scenery?--Hey, look at the red car.... No, it’s a motor-bike.”

A lad on a red motorcycle whipped in a bright streak up the lane and through a snow ball battle of Gurdy’s brothers. He had a telegram for Mark from the house manager of the Walling: “No sale for next week. Miss Boyle requests play be withdrawn. Instruct.”

“Got her bellyfull,” Mark said and scribbled a return message ordering “Todgers Intrudes” withdrawn then another to the manager of “Captain Salvador” in Providence. He told Gurdy, “Now, she can’t say a thing. Well, let’s get back to town, son. We’ll have a lot to do, bringing ‘Salvador’ in next Wednesday.”

His motor carried them swiftly up New Jersey. Gurdy lounged and chattered beside Mark who couldn’t feel triumphant though he tried. The drive had been made so often with Margot and now he saw the child in all clarity, her bright pumps and the silver buckles she so liked stretched on the warmer close to his feet. Her older beauty flickered and faded like some intervening mist. Pain stabbed and jarred him. The snow of the upland gave out. Rain began. When they reached Broadway its lights were violet and wistful in the swirl above umbrellas.

“God, what an ugly town,” said Gurdy.

“Ain’t it? Don’t know what people that like something pretty’d do if it weren’t for the shows--and the damned movies.”

They dined in a restaurant and another manager chaffed Mark about “Todgers Intrudes” leaning drunk on the table.

“And I hear it goes to the storehouse?”

“Yes ... but the show business is a gamble, Bill.”

“Ain’t it? Say, have you seen this hunk of nothin’ I’ve got up to my place? Have you seen it? God, go up and take a look at it! I get a bellyache every time I go near it. Turnin’ them away, though. Well, here today and hell tomorrow.”

His treasurer came to meet Mark in the glittering vestibule where a few men smoked forlornly against the blue panels. Mark glanced at the slip showing the receipts and laughed, commenced talking of “Captain Salvador.” His force gathered about him. Gurdy strolled away. A petty laughter rattled out of the doors and Gurdy passed in. The lit stage showed him a sprinkle of heads on the sweep of the seats. There was no one in the boxes. Two ushers were rolling dice by the white arch of the smokeroom. A couple of women left the poor audience and hurried by the boy dejectedly. He walked out through the vestibule where more men were collecting around Mark’s height and the swift happiness of his face as he talked of next week. Gurdy marched along the proud front of the theatre and turned into the alley that led from street to street. One bulb shone above the stage door and sent down a glistening coat for the large black motor standing there. Gurdy kept close to the other wall. There was a woman smoking in the limousine. The spark made a heart inside the shadow. Gurdy stared and was eaten by rage against her. He stood staring.

The stage door opened. The few performers began to leave. They moved up or down the alley to join the bright motion of the glowing streets outside. Their feet stirred the pools of rain on the pavement. Their voices ebbed and tinkled in the lofty alley. At last a slim man in a grey coat ran from the door and jumped into the black motor which moved, now, and slid away, jolted into the southward street. Gurdy was moving, too, when other lights woke high on the brick wall. An iron shutter grated, opening, and men appeared in the fissure. They bellowed down to the old doorkeeper, “Ain’t them guys from Cain’s got here, yet?”

“They ain’t to come ’til eleven fifteen.”

“Hell, it’s after!”

The stage hands cursed merrily. One of them mimicked Rand’s English accent to much applause. Then the great drays from the storehouse came grinding along the alley in a steam as the horses snorted. The stage hands and carters swore at each other. The vast screens were slung and handed down. The fleet quality of this failure bit Gurdy. He leaned dreary on the wall and saw Mark standing close to him, face raised to the lights, an odd small grin twisting his mouth. Mark did not move or speak.

He was thinking confusedly of many things. It was hard to think at all. One of the stage hands whistled a waltz that people liked. The melody caught at Mark’s mind and drew it away from the moment, forward and back. He hunted justice. Things went wrong. People weren’t kind. Next week the new play would glitter and people would applaud. Gurdy might come to write plays, the best possible plays. He watched the wreck melt. People would forget this. It would sink into shadow. No one would understand but they would forget. It was trivial in his long success. It horribly hurt him. He had been fooled in love. It was laughable. Things happened so. One must go on and forget about them. One of the horses neighed and stamped. A blue spark jetted up from the pavement, above a pool.

“Here goes nothin’,” a stage hand yelled, letting down the last screen. The iron shutter closed over the laughter. The carters whined and the drays were backed down the alley. The rain fell silently between Mark the red of the wall making it purple--a wonderful colour. The guiding lights went out. Mark sighed and took Gurdy’s arm. They walked together toward the gleaming crowd of the street. Yet feeling this warmth beside him Mark walked without much pain.

THE END

TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:

Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_.

Obvious typographical errors have been corrected.

Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.