|THE Crossroads Theater was nothing more than an old store, with a
shallow stage built in at the rear and a rough foyer boarded off at the
front. The seats were rows of undertaker's chairs, But the lighting
was managed with some skill; and the scenery, built and painted in the
neighborhood, bordered on a Barker-Craig-Reinhardt effectiveness.
Peter and Hy stood for a little time in the foyer, watching the audience
come in. It was a distinctly youthful audience--the girls and women were
attractive, most of them Americans; the men running more foreign, with
a good many Russian Jews among them. They all appeared to be
great friends. And they handled one another a good deal. Peter,
self-conscious, hunting copy as always, saw one tired-looking young
Jewish painter catch the hand of a pretty girl--an extraordinarily
pretty girl, blonde, of a slimly rounded figure--and press and caress
her fingers as he chatted casually with a group.
After a moment the girl drew her hand away gently, half-apologetically,
while a faint wave of color flowed to her transparent cheek.
All Peter's blind race prejudice flamed into a little fire of rage. Here
it was--his subject--the restless American girl experimenting with life,
the selfish bachelor girl, deep in the tangles of Bohemia, surrounded by
just the experimental men that would be drawn to the district by such as
she....
So Peter read it. And he was tom by confused clashing emotions. Then he
heard a fresh voice cry: “Why, hello, Betty!” Then he remembered--this
girl was the Picabia dancer--Betty Deane--her friend! There was color in
his own face now, and his pulse was leaping.
“Come,” he said shortly to Hy, “let's find our seats.”
The first playlet on the bill was Zanin's _Any Street._
The theme was the grim influence of street life on the mind of a child.
It was an uncomfortable little play. All curtains were drawn back.
Subjects were mentioned that should never, Peter felt, be even hinted at
in the presence of young women. Rough direct words were hurled at that
audience.
Peter, blushing, peered about him. There sat the young women and girls
by the dozen, serene of face, frankly interested.
Poor Hy, overcome by his tangled self-consciousness, actually lowered
his head and pressed his handkerchief to his fiery face, murmuring:
“This is no place for a minister's assistant!” And he added, in Peter's
ear: “Lord, if the Walrus could just see this--once!”
Then a newsboy came running on the stage--slim, light of foot--dodged
cowering in a saloon doorway, and swore at an off-stage policeman from
whose clutches he had escaped.
There was a swift pattering of applause; and a whisper ran through the
audience. Peter heard one voice say: “There she is--that's Sue!”
He sat erect, on the edge of his chair. Again the hot color surged into
his face. He felt it there and was confused.
It was his girl of the apple, in old coat and knickerbockers, tom
stockings, torn shirt open at the neck, a ragged felt hat over her short
hair.
Peter felt his resentment fading. He knew as he watched her move about
the stage that she had the curious electric quality that is called
personality. It was in her face and the poise of her head, in the lines
of her body, in every easy movement. She had a great gift..
After this play the two went outside to smoke, very silent, suppressed
even. Neither knew what to think or what to say.
There Zanin found them (for Peter was, after all, a bit of a personage)
and made them his guests.
Thus it was that Peter found himself behind the scenes, meeting
the youthful, preoccupied members of the company and watching with
half-suppressed eagerness the narrow stairway by which Sue Wilde must
sooner or later mount from the region of dressing-rooms below.
Finally, just before the curtain was rung up on the second play, he was
rewarded by the appearance of Betty Deane, followed by the tam o'shanter
and the plaid coat of his apple girl.
He wondered if her heart was jumping as his was.
Surely the electric thrill of this meeting, here among heaps of scenery
and properties, must have touched her, too. He could not believe that
it began and ended with himself. There was magic in the occasion, such
magic as an individual rarely generates alone. But if it touched her,
she gave no outward sign. To Zanin's casual, “Oh, you know each other,”
she responded with a quite matter-of-fact smile and nod.
They went out into the audience, and up an aisle to seats in the rear of
the hall--Betty first, then Sue and Peter, then Hy.
Peter felt the thrill again in walking just behind her, aware through
his very nerve-rips of her grace and charm of movement. When he stood
aside to let her pass on to her seat her sleeve brushed his arm; and the
arm, his body, his brain, tingled and flamed.
Zanin joined them after the last play and led them to a basement
restaurant near the Square. Hy paired off with Betty and made progress.
But then, Betty was evidently more Hy's sort than Sue was.
In the restaurant, Peter, silent, gloomy, watched his chance for a word
aside with Sue. When it came, he said: “I'm very glad you told me to
come.”
“You liked it then?”
“I liked you.”
This appeared to silence her.
“You have distinction Your performance was really interesting.”
“I'm glad you think that.”
“In some ways you are the most gifted girl I have ever seen. Listen! I
must see you again.”
She smiled.
“Let's have a bite together one of these evenings--at the Parisian or
Jim's. I want to talk with you.”
“That would be pleasant,” said she, after a moment's hesitation.
“To-morrow evening, perhaps?” Peter suggested.
The question was not answered; for in some way the talk became general
just then. Later Peter was sure that Sue herself had a hand in making it
general.
Zanin turned suddenly to Peter. He was a big young man, with a strong
if peasant-like face and a look of keenness about the eyes. There
was exuberant force in the man, over which his Village manner of
sophisticated casualness toward all things lay like the thinnest of
veneers.
“Well,” he said, “what do you think of Sue here?”
Peter repeated his impressions with enthusiasm.
“We're going to do big things with her,” said Zanin. “Big things. You
wait. _Any Street_ is just a beginning.” And then an impetuous eagerness
rushing up in him, his topic shifted from Sue to himself. With a
turbulent, passionate egotism he recounted his early difficulties in
America, his struggles with the language, heart-breaking summers as a
book agent, newspaper jobs in middle-western cities, theatrical press
work from Coast to Coast, his plunge into the battle for a higher
standard of theatrical art and the resulting fight, most desperate of
his life thus far, to attract attention to the Crossroads Theater and
widen its influence.
Zarin was vehement now. Words poured in a torrent from his lips. He
talked straight at you, gesturing, with a light in his eye and veiled
power in his slightly husky voice. Peter felt this power, and something
not unlike a hatred of the man took sudden root within him.
“You will think me foolish to give my strength to this struggle. Like
you, I know these Americans. You can tell me nothing about them. Oh, I
have seen them, lived with them--in the city, in the small village, on
the farm. I know that they are ignorant of Art, that they do not care.”
He snapped his big fingers. “Vaudeville, baseball, the girl show, the
comic supplement, the moving picture--that is what they like! Yet year
after year, I go on fighting for the barest recognition. They do
not understand. They do not care. They believe in money, comfort,
conformity--above all conformity. They are fools. But I know them, I
tell you! And I know that they will listen to me yet! I have shown them
that I can fight for my ideals. Before we are through I shall show
them that I can beat them at their own game. They shall see that I mean
business. I shall show them their God Success in his full majesty....
And publicity? They are children. When I have finished they---the best
of them---will come to me for kindergarten lessons in publicity. I'm
hoping to talk with you about it, Mann, I can interest you. I wouldn't
bring it to you unless I _knew_ I could interest you.”
He turned toward Sue. “And this girl shall help me. She has the talent,
the courage, the breeding. She will surprise the best of them. They will
find her pure gold.”
Hushed with his own enthusiasm, he dropped his hand over one of Sue's;
took hers up in both of his and moved her slender fingers about as he
might have played absently with a handkerchief or a curtain string.
Hy, across the table, took this in; and noted too the swift, hot
expression that flitted across Peter's face and the sudden set to his
mouth.
Sue, alter a moment, quietly withdrew her hand. But she did not flush,
as Betty had flushed in somewhat similar circumstances a few hours
earlier.
Peter laid his hands on the table; pushed back his chair; and, lips
compressed, got up.
“Oh,” cried Zanin--“not going?”
“I must,” Peter replied, slowly, coldly. “I have work to do. It has been
very pleasant. Good night.”
And out he went.
Hy, after some hesitation, followed.
Peter did not speak until they were nearly across the Square. Then he
remembered--
“The Walrus asked you where she was, did he?”
“He sure did.”
“Worried about her, I suppose!”
“He's worried, all right.”
“Humph!” said Peter.
He said nothing more. At the rooms, He partly undressed in silence.
Now and again his long face worked in mute expression of conflicting
emotions within. Suddenly he stopped undressing and went into the
studio (he slept in there, on the couch) and sat by the window, peering
out at the sights of the Square.
Hy watched him curiously; then called out a good night, turned off
the gas and tumbled into bed. His final remark, the cheery
observation--“I'll tell you this much, my son. Friend Betty is some
pippin!” drew forth no response.