It was about eight o’clock in the evening, and Flora Utterbourne sat by a
lamp in her little apartment. She was wearing the same gown she wore the
day she met Mr. Curry on the way to Crawl Hill. A book lay in her lap.
She was expecting some people who were to drop in and look the apartment
over with an eye to subletting from her. She read a little and cut a
few pages with her tiny Swiss paper knife. A small clock was ticking
somewhere in shadow. It was very quiet: no sounds but the ticking of the
clock and the rustle of pages. After a bit she closed the book upon a
long first finger and let her head drop back against the Egyptian shawl
which so beautifully disguised and enriched a very plain little second
hand arm chair. She closed her eyes and sat musing.
Presently there was a ring at the door. Ah, she thought, the people to
look at the apartment. And she glanced lovingly about as she went to
admit them to her sanctum. The rooms were somehow so entirely _hers_.
One would suppose she had lived here always. Everything delighted
and refreshed the eye. Here one encountered the most harmonious sort
of colour combination. The little drawing room illustrated the fine
compatibility of cream white, Burgundy rose, quiet apple green and
plum and there were delicate touches here and there of red and indigo,
and even warm, bright orange. Over the little white wood mantle was an
antique-looking reproduction of Burne-Jones’ familiar panel of angels on
a winding stair; in a dimmer spot was a madonna of Raphael’s. Flora took
it all in as she crossed, with just a tremor of wistful hesitation.
But lo! no sooner had she opened the door than she uttered an incredulous
cry. Then she held out her hand, and a moment later a man had her right
in his arms—a big man in a Palm Beach suit, wearing gay rings and a
beautiful new shiny toupee. Curry had paused for only one thing after
landing. A new toupee. He couldn’t call the way he was—it might have
proved positively fatal!
Well, as one may imagine, the first quarter of an hour or so was simply
indescribable. No, it is useless even to attempt it. Both talked at once
nearly the whole of the time, and laughed. After that things began to
quiet down a little, though there were still intermittent outbursts. How
could they help themselves?
It developed that the impulsive impresario, who was behaving just exactly
like a kid, hadn’t had a mouthful of dinner. There was talk of slipping
out together for something; but then Flora remembered she had promised to
be at home all evening on account of the people who were coming to look
at the apartment. And Curry wouldn’t go out alone. He said he’d starve
first. So Flora said: “Let’s go and _see_ what there is in the ‘ice box,’
though I’m dreadfully _afraid_ there isn’t enough to satisfy such a big
hungry _man_!”
But behold! there was! Oh, yes—there was a really sumptuous dinner in the
ice box! Flora evolved a fine crisp salad, and produced a little platter
of cold chicken. She made a pot of coffee, while, under her cordial and
excited directions, the impresario spread a cloth on their gate-legged
table and brought out the requisite silver and china. In ever so short a
time they were seated with their table between them. And Flora said that
of _course_ she couldn’t really eat a _thing_, but that she would just
_nibble_ a little to keep him “company.”
Her face took on a look of exaggerated, grave, and high concern as he
told her more about the wreck of the _Skipping Goone_ than it had been
possible to squeeze into a cable. His eyes brimmed for a moment with the
unhappy memory. But then her face lighted, for he was reminding her that,
after all, here he was, safe and sound—“alive to tell the tale, though
Good Lord! when the bolt struck us I never expected to be!”
Her voice was rich with happiness. “And _Africa_,” she laughed, “—I was
‘reading up’ on it so _diligently_. I thought I’d even try to go _down_
there, since my agent says he hears there are delightful ‘apartments’ in
_Johannesburg_!”
But Mr. Curry shook his head slowly, and his eyes looked suspiciously
moist again. He was thinking of his songbirds. When he spoke there was a
tone of deep sadness in his voice. “We’ve come to the end of our world
tour that was going to mark such an epoch in the history of opera—” He
sighed a little.
“But,” she told him warmly, “I think it has, _anyhow_!”
“Everything went,” he mused, “—scenery, properties—even my glorious prima
donna—”
“What?” cried Flora in alarm. “Miss _Valentine_? She—she wasn’t
_drowned_?”
“Oh, no,” he laughed. “Merely gobbled up by one of the big bugs, that’s
all.”
She showed him, nevertheless, a face full of sympathetic despair. “It’s
the most _outrageous_ thing I ever _heard_ of!”
But it all seemed to matter so little to him now. He seized her hands and
gave her a look of such delightful impetuosity that she couldn’t help
looking down at her plate.
“Don’t you see?” he cried in a loud gay voice. “It’s brought us to the
way out!”
“_Has_ it?” she asked softly.
“There’s a chance, if we hold hands tight and jump, of getting off the
merry-go-round at last!”
“Oh—_tell_ me about it!” she begged, her face brimming with eagerness.
“Well,” he said, “since I’m ruined, what’s to be done but make the best
of things? There may be brighter days ahead, but right this minute things
might be worse than they are. The fact is, I know of a job—it’s as leader
of the orchestra in a theatre here in San Francisco. I—I believe it’s a
movie theatre, but what of that? It wouldn’t last forever, and I’d keep
my eyes open all the time for a chance to put over my great dream. In the
meantime, though humble, the job would pay—well, enough for two to live
on, I guess, if we didn’t sail too high. And at least it would be all in
one place—the job, I mean—which is an advantage that couldn’t be claimed
by the world tour, you see! Lord, it’s too beautiful to think of!”
And she was quite as excited and pleased as he. “Why, I’m _sure_ we
could manage, and it would _really_ be the finest kind of _adventure_ to
have to skrimp and ‘figure,’ and I’ve a small ‘income,’ you know, from
all those _apartments_ in the East, so that if the ‘wolf’ ever actually
_threatened_ to break in, why we could sell some of the _things_, though
of course I _know_,” she embroidered, “your job at the ‘movies’ couldn’t
last _forever_, since new opportunities are _sure_ to open up—we’ll
make them!” For suddenly she remembered, and not without a quick little
heartache, how he had poured out to her his big, ardent dreams that day
at the Hoadley auction. “I’ll ‘back you up’ with all my _might_,” she
said in her gracious, heartening way. “We’ll manage by ‘hook or crook’
to keep _advancing_, and in the meantime, we can stay right on _here_ in
this little _place_, which is so comfortable, though of course _small_,
and to which I think I’ve grown more ‘attached’ than to any of the
_others_—”
There was an interrupting ring. Her face fell.
“Oh—I’d _forgotten_! The people who are thinking of sub-_letting_....”
She rose, a little upset.
But Curry kept his head—and afterward bragged of it, too. “Don’t even let
’em cross the doorstep!” he commanded, very firmly. “Tell ’em you’re out.
Tell ’em you’ve changed your mind. Tell ’em anything at all, but don’t
let them in!”
And when the intruders were safely disposed of, the big, joyous
impresario, smiling as he certainly never smiled before in his whole
life, made Flora tie one of her aprons around his waist; and he insisted
on washing the dishes, while she dried them.