“Mr. Bonnat, I’m going away from New York, to do some more of that--that
living-picture work.” I waited a moment to see what he would say--he had
not turned around--and then I added, as I wanted to see if he really
cared--“Maybe I won’t come back at all.”
He stood up, and took me by the shoulders, making me look straight at
him.
“How long are you to be gone?” he demanded, as if he had penetrated my
ruse.
“Two weeks in Providence,” I said, “but if we succeed, we go on to
Boston and--”
“Promise me you’ll come back in two weeks. Promise me that,” he said.
He was looking straight down into my eyes, and I think I would have
promised him anything he asked me to; so I said in a little weak voice:
“I promise.”
“Good!” he replied. “I would not let you go, if it were in my power to
stop you, but I know you need the money, and I have no right to deprive
you of it. Oh, good God! it’s _hell_ not to be able to--” He broke off,
and gently took my hands up in his:
“Look here, little mouse. There’s a chance of my being able to make a
big pot of money. I’ll know in a few days’ time. Then you shall not have
to worry about anything. But as I am now fixed, why I can’t stop you
from anything. I haven’t the right.”
I wanted to tell him that he could stop me from going if he wanted to;
but he had not told me he cared for me, and there was a possibility
that I was mistaken about him. He had that big, gentle way with every
one, and it might be that I had mistaken his kindly interest in me for
something that he did not really feel. So I laughed now lightly, and I
said:
“Oh, I’ll be back soon, and if you like you can see me off on the
train.”
When we were in the Grand Central the following night, I tried to appear
cheerful, but I could not prevent the tears running down my face, and
when finally he took my hand to say good-bye, I said:
“Oh, it’s dreadful for me to say this; b-but if I don’t see you soon
again I--t-think I will die.”
He bent down when I said that and kissed me right on my lips, and he did
not seem to care whether every one in the station saw us or not. Then I
knew that he did love me, and that knowledge sent me flying blindly down
the platform. After I was aboard, I found I had taken the wrong train to
Providence. I should have taken an earlier or a later one. Lil was
already there, and was to have met me at the station from the earlier
train, but the train I had taken would not get in till four in the
morning.
When I arrived in Providence I did not know where to go. I had Lil’s
address, but she had written me she was living at a “very respectable
house” where the people would have been terribly shocked to know she was
a model, and I felt I could not go there at such an hour in the morning.
The rain was coming down in torrents. A colored boy was carrying my bag,
and he asked me where I wanted to go. Indeed, I did not know. When I
hesitated, he said that the hotels didn’t take ladies alone, but that he
knew of an all-night restaurant where I could get something hot to eat
and I could stay there till morning. So he took me over to Minks’. I had
often eaten in Minks’ restaurant in Boston, and the place looked quite
familiar to me. I had a cup of hot coffee and a sandwich, and then I
asked the waitress if there was some place where I could go and freshen
or clean up a bit. She whispered to the man at the desk, and he nodded,
and then she beckoned to me to follow her. We went upstairs to a sort of
loft. It was bare, save of packing cases, but she showed me to a little
cracked looking-glass where she said I could do my hair. I told her I
had been on the train all night, and she said sympathetically:
“Sure, you look it.”
I went over to Lil’s boarding-house about seven in the morning. She was
right near Minks’, and said I was foolish not to have come right over.
Well, we played every night in the theatre in Providence, and we made
what theatrical people call a “hit.” The whole town turned out to see
us. The girls were all as pleased as could be, and so was Mr. Hirsch,
and they made all kinds of plans for the road tour, but I could think of
nothing but New York, and I was so lonely, in spite of the noisy company
of the girls, that I used to go over and look at the railway tracks that
I knew ran clear to New York. And I thought of Paul! I thought of Paul
every single minute. The little maid would slip his letters every
morning under my door, and I used to cry and laugh before I even opened
them and I held them to my lips and face, and I kept them all in the
bosom of my dress, right next to me.
We had finished our engagement. Lil and I were coming out of the
dressing-room the last night when somebody slapped me on the back. I
turned around, and there was Mr. Davis. He was so glad to see me that he
nearly wrung my hand off, and he insisted on walking home with us. He
told me he was now manager of a theatrical company, and that he had been
looking around for me ever since Lil told him I was in New York.
“Now, Marion,” he said, “you are going to begin where you left off in
Montreal, and it’s up to you to make good. You’ve got it in you, and I
want to be the man to prove it.”
I asked him what he meant, and he said he was starting a new “show” in
Boston that week, and that he had a part for me that would give me an
opportunity.