Late in the evening, Matthias gave it up, and shaking off Rideout (whose
only hope had resided in the author's anxiety to save his play) betook
himself to an out-of-the-way restaurant to idle with a tasteless meal.
He was at once dog-weary and heart-sick.
The net outcome of some ten hours of runnings to and from, of meetings
and schemings, of conferences by telephone and of communications by
telegraph with those who had promised financial support to Rideout's
project, was an empty assurance, indifferently given by the Shuberts, to
the effect that, if nothing happened to make them think otherwise, they
might possibly be prepared to consider the advisability of producing
"The Jade God" about the first of January.
The truth of the situation was that neither the Shuberts nor any other
managerial concern was likely (as Wilbrow put it) "to look cross-eyed at
the piece" until they could get full control of it; which would be in
some three months, when Rideout's contract to produce would expire by
limitation. And since Rideout might be counted upon to hold on to his
contract rights till the last minute and leave nothing else undone in
the effort to recoup his already substantial losses, it was useless to
consider the play as anything but a property of potential value
relegated indefinitely to abeyance.
Matthias believed in the play with all his heart. During the last three
weeks he had watched it come to life and assume the form he had dreamed
for it, coloured with the rich hues of his imagination and quick with
the breath of living drama. And because he possessed in some measure
that rare faculty of being able to weigh justly the work of his own
hand, and had looked upon this and seen that it was good, he had counted
on it to win him that recognition which, more than money, his pride
craved--partly by way of some compensation for what it had suffered at
the hands of Venetia Tankerville.
He was still sore with the hurt of that experience. Privately he doubted
whether he would ever wholly recover from it; but the doubt was a very
private one, never discovered even to his most sympathetic friends, not
even to Helena, whose scorn of her sister-in-law remained immeasurable.
Fortunate in having been able to afford those several weeks in the
wooded hills of Maine, in their fragrant and passionless silences
Matthias had found peace and regained confidence in his old, well-tried,
wholesome code of philosophy; which held that though here and there a
man ill-used by chance or woman might be found, the world was none the
less sound and kind at heart, and good to live in.
For all that, he could not easily endure the thought of Venetia's
lowering herself to use him to further her love affair with Marbridge;
of Venetia going from his arms and lips to the lips and arms of that
insolent animal, Marbridge: the one amused by her successful cunning,
the other contemptuous in his conquest. And he often wondered with what
justice he judged the woman. It comforted him a little, at times, to
believe that she had not acted so cruelly altogether as a free agent, to
think her meeting with Marbridge in New York a freak of chance and fate,
her elopement an unpremeditated and spontaneous surrender to the
indisputable magnetism of the man. Marbridge commanded the reluctant
admiration of men who did not like him--who knew him too well to like
him. How much more easily, then, might he not have overcome the scruples
of a girl untutored in the knowledge of her own heart....
Or had it all been due merely to the fact that John Matthias was not a
man to hold the love of women? Such men exist, antipathetic to the
Marbridges of the world. Was he of their unhappy order, incapable of
inspiring enduring love?
He could review a modest cycle of flirtations with women variously
charming and willing to be amused, light-hearted attachments and
short-lived, one and all, those that might have proved more lasting
broken off without ill-will on either side--though always by the woman.
Venetia alone had named Love to him as if it stood to her for something
higher and more significant than the diversion of an empty hour--Venetia
who was now in Italy, the bride of Marbridge!
And yet, oddly enough, it wasn't his memories of Venetia and his regrets
and wounded self-esteem that rendered insipid his belated dinner and
made him presently abandon it in favour of the distracting throngs of
Broadway. They were thoughts of another woman altogether that urged him
forth and homeward--a poignant sympathy for Joan Thursday, the
friendless and forlorn, whose high anticipations had with his own that
day gone crashing to disaster. He couldn't remember what had made him
think of her, but now that he did, it was with disturbing interest.
He found himself suddenly very sorry for the girl--much more sorry for
her than for himself. What to him was at worst a staggering reverse, to
her must seem calamitous beyond repair.
It wasn't hard to conjure up a picture of the child, pitifully huddled
upon her bed, in tears, heart-broken, desolate, perhaps (since he had
not been home to pay her) supperless and hungry!
Matthias quickened his stride. His suddenly awakened and deep solicitude
tormented him. He had received evidence that Joan's was a nature
tempestuous and prone to extremes: he didn't like to contemplate the
lengths to which despair might drive her.
Through the texture of this new-found care ran a thread of irritation
that it should have proved a care to him. He realized that he must of
late have been giving a deal of thought to the girl. Formerly he had
been aware of her much as he was of Madame Duprat; such kindness as he
had shown her had been no greater than, and of much the same order as,
he would have shown a stray puppy. Tonight he found himself unable to
contemplate her as other than a vital figure in his life--a creature of
fire and blood, of spirit and flesh, at once enigmatic and absolute,
owning claims upon his consideration no less actual because passive. He
who had pledged his ability and willingness to find her a foothold on
the stage, was responsible for her present distress and disappointment.
And if his good offices had been sought rather than voluntary, still was
he responsible; for she wouldn't have dreamed of seeking them if he
hadn't in the first place insisted on putting her under obligation to
him. He had in a measure bidden her to look to him; now it was his part
to look out for her.
Hardly a pleasant predicament: Matthias resented it bitterly, with
impatience conceding the weight of that doctrine which teaches the fatal
responsibility of man for his hand's each and every idle turn. He had
paused to pity a stray child of the town; and because of that, he now
found himself saddled with her welfare. A situation exasperating to a
degree! And, he argued, it was merely this subconscious sense of duty
which had of late held the girl so prominently in his mind--ever since,
in fact, that night when she had broken down and impulsively kissed his
hand. Just that one hot-headed, frantic, foolish act had primarily
brought home to Matthias his obligations as the object of her unsought,
unwelcome gratitude....
He found Joan waiting on the stoop: a silent and vigilant figure, aloof
from the other lodgers--a woman and two or three men lounging on the
steps. And as these moved aside to give Matthias way, Joan rose and
slipped quietly indoors, where in the hall she turned back with a
gesture that too clearly betrayed the strain and tensity of her
emotions; but, to his gratification, she was dry of eye and outwardly
composed.
"You were waiting for me?" he asked; and taking assent for granted
rattled on with a show of cheerful contrition: "Sorry I'm late. There
were ten dozen stones we had to turn, you know."
Her eyes questioned.