Part 18

"I hope this is all clear, and that I have not overlooked anything. Perhaps when you are about it you had better fire Grace Farquar, too. Pretty girls are cheap, and I should like another more come-on, preferably a blonde this time. Received your check for $1,182.40. No more for the present. Cordially yours, Shamus O'Dowd."

CHAPTER XXIV

The right girl's cheek against his own is usually worth more to a man than all the philosophy to be found in books. Adair was stunned; he was too helpless, too hurt even to murmur. When one is struck by a thunderbolt, one lies where one falls. He expected Phyllis to fall also, and in a dull, heart-broken way was surprised by her intrepidity. She picked up the great, despairing creature; kissed him, petted him, crooned over him like a baby, smiling through her tears, and exerting all her pretty fancifulness to make him smile, too. Men may excel in marching up to cannon and saving people from burning buildings, and descending to the bottom of the sea in submarines; but in the forlorn hopes of life it is most often the women who lead.

After a while Adair was revived; on examination it seemed that he wasn't seriously damaged at all, only scared—oh, yes—just scared all out of his poor Booful wits; and a fairy potion called: "What does anything matter as long as we have each other?" was extraordinarily effective in pulling him together again. Then Phyllis jumbled up all the swear-words she had ever heard, and hurled them indiscriminately at Shamus O'Dowd, with such piquancy and humor, coming as they did from that sweet mouth, and with such a delicious lady-intonation that Adair was convulsed, and a tiny bit shocked—which was precisely what she had schemed for, the daring little wretch.

Thus began a new era of looking for an engagement; and it must be said it was a very sad, anxious, bitter era, for they were dreadfully poor—hungry-poor—and every time there was a knock at the door it was a dun who had to be coaxed and persuaded into going away. Adair's recent prominence had done little to incline managers towards him, and though they were more civil, and he generally got greater consideration at their hands, it was evident that their former hostility still persisted. But his professional reputation now stood pretty high; and occasionally one, bolder than the rest, would coquette with him, keeping him on tenter-hooks while a frantic search was made "for somebody that would do as well." This somebody was always found, and Adair would be told politely that "the vacancy had been filled."

Incidentally he learned that his parting from O'Dowd had been grossly misrepresented by that "genial star," who had spread it about broadcast that Adair was as impossible as ever, and so inflated and top-lofty that it had been cheaper to break the run of the piece than to stand his vagaries any longer. This was in such accord with Adair's former character that it found ready credence up and down Broadway; and the great Mr. Fielman himself enunciated the general sentiment when he said to Rolls Reece, the dramatist: "If that fellow Adair only had the manners and decency of a common hod-carrier, I'd give him a five years' contract, and make a fortune out of him; but the stage is on too high a level nowadays for men like that to get a second chance to disgrace it—at least from me!"

No one appreciates more than an actor the need for being well-dressed when seeking an engagement. His appearance is a considerable part of his capital, both on the boards and off; he may have had little breakfast, and less lunch, but his clothes must be good, and his linen immaculate, and in a "profession" judged so largely by superficialities, it behooves him, poor dog, to affect at any cost an air of fashion that but too often is the most pathetic of masquerades.

It was now that Phyllis rose to the occasion with an unexpected capacity that showed she was, indeed, her father's daughter. She got the janitress to teach her how to wash and iron white shirts; and in a short time could glaze a bosom better than her instructress, and almost as well as a French laundry-man. She learned how to press Adair's coats and trousers; she turned his ties; she ironed his collars; she cleaned his gloves with gasolene. No man was ever valeted with more assiduous care, or sent out every morning looking sprucer or better-groomed. When she kissed him good-by for the day it was always with a playful admonition, for Adair bore adversity none too well, and though he tried to hide his despondency he was beginning to break down under the long continued strain.

"And he knows he's a great, big, handsome, splendid Booful?"

"Oh, he's sure of it!"

"And he's going to step out like a Crown Prince going down to see his Emperor-Papa at the club?"

"You bet he is."

"And swing his cane as though he owned all Broadway—and throw back his head like a Greek statue, and swagger into their horrid old offices like a millionaire? For he is a millionaire, you know—not a money-one, but a Love-Millionaire—for don't I love him millions and millions?"

It took a kiss to answer that; and then the Love-Millionaire, laughing a little tremulously, would hurry away, whistling with much bravado as he went down the stairs, two at a time, as suited a great, big, handsome, splendid Booful; who, whatever his demerits in the past, was fast retrieving himself before the Great Judge.—And if, on his departure, Phyllis would lay her head on her arm and give way to uncontrollable tears, you would be wrong to feel too sorry for her. For the misfortune that draws a man and woman together, and extorts from each their noblest qualities is not really a misfortune at all, but a precious and beautiful thing that it would become us more to envy.

Thus the days passed in a deadening, cowing, unutterably depressing search for work. Adair was rebuffed, put off, told to call again; he abased himself to men he despised; he forced his presence with hungry persistence on dramatists and stars who were putting on new plays, affecting a good fellowship that was a transparent, dismal lie. He tried to buy them wine, cigars—inveigle them into promises, and his lunch often went in a tip to some greedy understrapper who guarded their portals.

It is strange the mile-wide demarcation that divides the real stage—the stage of Sothern, John Drew, Faversham, Maude Adams, etc., from that other to which Adair had so long associated himself. This other had no representative save Adair in the whole Thespian Club. It was a region apart, and a region that Adair was determined never to return to. It would have called him back willingly enough, and in his desperation he might have returned to it had it not been for Phyllis. It was she who kept his resolution alive; she was too confident of his talent to let him throw it back into that Dead Sea; it meant the abandonment of every serious ambition;—artistically speaking, suicide, death.—Booful belonged to the top, and it was his business and hers to get him there.

Brave words, but how about fulfilment? The end of the month would find them turned out of doors. Phyllis dreaded to see herself in the glass, she was becoming so pale and wan; in the unequal battle everything was going except her courage; sometimes, alone in the silent apartment, even that seemed to droop, and a daunting terror would overwhelm her—less for herself than for Adair. He was drinking again, and justified himself with a bitter vehemence. "They all say, 'Have a drink'!" he exclaimed. "Nobody ever says 'Have an eat'!"—His harsh, despairing humor recurred to her, as well as his sudden resentment at her pity. He had made atonement, but the sting remained—or rather a foreboding of something somber and evil that in spite of herself she could not shake off.

One day at the club a card was brought Adair, inscribed Mr. John H. Campbell; and the boy told him the gentleman was waiting to see him in the visitors' room. Adair knew no such person, but he went out to greet him with mingled curiosity and hope, for here perhaps was the long-sought engagement. An imposing, distinguished looking, very well-dressed man of fifty rose from the sofa, and asked him, with much suavity, whether he had the pleasure of addressing Mr. Cyril Adair. This question being quickly and politely settled, the imposing gentleman begged for a few words of conversation; and indicating a place for Adair beside him, he reseated himself with a bland, kind air which yet was not without an underlying seriousness, not to say solemnity.

"I have come on a very confidential matter," he said, fixing Adair with his shrewd, keen, heavy-lidded eyes. "A matter, Mr. Adair, so delicate that it is not easy to convey it except in a round-about form. May I explain I have sought you out at the request of—Mr. Ladd?"

There was a pause; the shrewd, heavy-lidded eyes slowly inventoried Adair and read beneath the tarnished air of fashion. Failure, need, hunger sap a man, and can not be hid, least of all from a professional observer. John Hampden Campbell was one of the leaders of the New York bar and was what they call a "court room lawyer" of high rank; which means that others hand up the guns, while he shoots them off. His knowledge of human nature was profound, and being profound was neither unsympathetic nor unkind. But he could shoot straight, nevertheless, and it was hardly a satisfaction to the victim to hear that murmur of "poor devil!" as the eminent counsel laid aside the smoking weapon.

"My father-in-law!" exclaimed Adair in amazement.

"He would be happier if he could cease to bear that name," said Mr. Campbell.

"He can hardly very well help himself," retorted Adair bluntly.

"No, but you could," put in the lawyer, with a vagueness that was intentional. "By this time you must realize that it is a union that is scarcely to your own best interests nor the young lady's."

"Haven't noticed it," said Adair, staring at him queerly.

"Mr. Ladd would be prepared to make very heavy sacrifices to put back things as they were before."

"What sort of sacrifices?"—Adair's tone was not unfriendly; it was rather questioning and perplexed.

"We would rather leave it to you to suggest them, though we are counting more on your concern for her welfare. Frankly, Mr. Adair, without meaning the least disrespect, and with a thorough knowledge of your honorable and straightforward conduct—do you consider you're acting rightly in holding this young lady to what most people would call a very bad bargain?"

"Being married to a starving actor?"

"Oh, that is putting it too—too—"

"Of course, she has thrown herself away—I know that."

There was a gleam in the heavy-lidded eyes.

"It could all be rectified," said Mr. Campbell soothingly. "Very easily, and very quickly rectified. It is just a question, it seems to me, of our getting together, and talking it over reasonably. In fact, some of the details might be omitted entirely. Mr. Ladd is a man of very large means, and is the soul of honor. He would see to it that your future was made easy."

"How easy?" asked Adair.

"I mean," returned Mr. Campbell, "that he would substantially recognize your honest desire to be guided by his wishes—wishes that you admit are just, and so much to the young lady's advantage that you are willing to withdraw entirely."

"Those are all words," exclaimed Adair; "let's get to figures."

Mr. Campbell looked pained. After having confined the interview so skilfully within the limits of irreproachable good taste, this brutality outraged his ear. He had not been unprepossessed by Adair, and felt sorry for him.—But here was the cloven hoof.—The fellow was just a low, mercenary adventurer after all.

"The figures are ten thousand dollars," he answered coldly.

"Why, I don't call that anything!"

"Cash," added Campbell, with a pursing of his lips.

"Of course, it's cash," cried Adair, "it's going to be that, whatever it is. Only it isn't enough. She's worth more than ten thousand dollars."

Campbell saw that his personal bias had made him err. Adair's vibrating tone had caught the note of his own; suavity and good humor were all-important, and he scurried back to them, like an incautious general flying for the batteries he has left behind. When he spoke again it was in his best lullaby manner.

"My dear fellow," he said, "the real point is that you concede the principle. That is so, is it not?"

"Hell, yes," returned Adair. "I'd concede a lot for fifty thousand dollars."

"But that is a very, very large sum of money."

Adair, with one hand in his trousers pocket, was restlessly turning over the two nickels that were there—all he had.

"I don't think so," he said. "Anyway, she's worth that, and more."

"I was hardly authorized to commit Mr. Ladd to such an amount," objected Mr. Campbell, "though I will not say right off that I might not entertain it. But you understand, Mr. Adair, that it implies you will not resist an action for divorce, and— Well, you know we'd like to have the matter absolutely settled and done with."

"For fifty thousand dollars?"

The heavy-lidded eyes were obscured by a momentary glaze.

"We will meet you," said Mr. Campbell.

Adair rubbed the nickels together, and asked, with a slight catch of his breath, if he could have something on account.

"Certainly," assented the lawyer, producing his pocket-book. He removed a sheaf of bills, and Adair perceived that they were in denominations of a thousand dollars each. He had never seen a thousand-dollar bill before in his whole life, and here was a thick packet of twenty or more. No wonder that he was overawed. Campbell noticed his fascinated stare, and dilly-dallying with the notes, spread them out with an elaborate carelessness. To Adair, it was all a blur of $1,000, $1,000, $1,000, $1,000, a green mist of money, a crisp, crinkling, dizzying affluence.—Campbell was saying something to him. There was a paper to be signed. It was a temporary memorandum to be replaced later by a more formal document. Buzz, buzz, buzz! The paper was handed to him. Buzz, buzz, buzz, and the room going round and round. He was standing on his feet, shaking with the pent-up passion that he had been so long holding back. The actor in him had been waiting for that, but the actor was lost in the man.

"You're a damned hound!" he cried hoarsely, "And the man who sent you is a damned hound, and here is your damned paper, and may it choke you both! My wife isn't for sale, do you hear that! My wife isn't for sale, whether it's for fifty thousand or fifty million! Is that plain? Do you concede the principle, or shall I boot it into you? I thought I'd lead you on; I thought I'd just see how far you'd go—you with your sable overcoat, and fat pocket-book, and your stinking respectability. I had you sized up all right, and was only giving you rope to hang yourself. Get out of here, and get out quick, or I'll kick you from here to your cab. Get out!"

It was needless to say that John Hampden Campbell did not need to be pressed. Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego in the fiery furnace could have scarcely been in a bigger hurry. Cramming the notes and papers in his pockets, he sped from the visitors' room like a large, imposing projectile which had been fired from some monster cannon. A second later his flying coat-tails were deposited in his cab, and he was speeding away, considerably shaken in spirit and body, for the mountain quiet of his twenty-eight story office.

Lying on Phyllis' table, all ready for mailing, was a long letter to her father. Pride had crumbled and she had determined to seek his help. She had begun it with constraint, attempting, none too effectually, to conceal her sense of injury and injustice; but as page followed page the old tenderness returned with an irresistible force. That gray, handsome head was before her, that mellow voice was in her ears, and the wretchedness and folly of alienation came home to her with a new and piercing significance. The request for money; the cold, exact exposition of her need—was passed and forgotten in the impetuous rush of her pen. She loved her husband, she loved her father, and this estrangement was unbearable. Like many women under the stress of a deep emotion she wrote with a singular eloquence. She wept as she described Cyril—his unceasing goodness, his loyalty, his fortitude, his good humor and devotion. He was everything a woman loved best in a man; and instead of her marriage having been a mistake, a failure, it was more than she thought life could ever give her. Would not her father forget all that had passed, as she, too, would forget? Their love was too deep, too dear, to make reconciliation impossible. She would climb into his lap again, and put her arms about him—his sad, worn, desolate little girl—and they would whisper to each other what fools they had been, and kiss away the last shadow of misunderstanding.

So it ran, page after page, in her fine, delicate hand, an appeal that no father could have resisted. A beautiful letter, touched with the quality of tears; full of womanly longing; heart crying to heart, across an aching void. Alas, that it never went. It was torn to pieces, and thrown passionately on the floor. Campbell had intervened, and the news of his offer was thus received in the little flat on East Fifty-eighth Street. "That's the end of it," cried Phyllis, regarding the scraps of paper. "That's the end of everything between Papa and me!"

CHAPTER XXV

It is one of the peculiarities of looking for a theatrical engagement that hope is never quite extinguished. There is always some one who wants you to call next week; there is always a company just short of a part they are considering you for; there is always some friendly member of the Thespians who has "mentioned your name," and gives you a scribbled address or a telephone number. This is stated to explain the fact why Adair, instead of surrendering to circumstances, as any other man would have done in any other walk of life, still snatched at straw after straw with egregious determination. His circumstances were becoming absolutely desperate. Suspension from the club was staring him in the face; in eight days his sticks of furniture and his trunks would be dumped out on the street; it was only by the most rigid parsimony that body and soul could be kept together. Phyllis said the dormice were floating on a shingle, and with tearful laughter would expatiate on the pitiful, half-drowned things, so scared and hungry on a bobbing sea. What was to happen when they slid off?—Oh, but Booful wasn't to mind. She'd hold his poor, pretty, dormouse head up, and swim him off to a lovely island where there were peanuts on peanuts, and an alabaster mousery with all modern improvements.

That lovely island seemed a terribly long way off. As the emblem of an engagement it lay so far over the horizon that Adair began to doubt its very existence. His eyes grew lack-luster; he lost his confident bearing; poverty and failure stamped him, as they stamp every man with an unmistakable mark. We instinctively move away from the unsuccessful. We see that mark, and widen our distance. Success likes success. It isn't decent to be very, very poor. Fingers tighten on pocketbooks, and respectable, prosperous legs quicken their steps.—Adair was sinking, though the dismal masquerade still went on—the immaculate cuffs, the once smart tie, the pressed clothes, shiny with constant ironing. There is many such a figure on Broadway—and in some mean room there is usually a woman who believes in him, stinting herself and starving for his sake.

One dark, wintry Sunday afternoon in early spring, as Phyllis was sitting near the frosted window, sewing and thinking and dreaming by the scanty light, she was roused by the tramp of many footsteps on the stair outside, and a confused bumping, scuffling sound, accompanied by a hoarse murmur of voices. With a horrible premonition she ran to the door and opened it, giving a cry as she recognized Adair being supported in by two companions. His face was swollen and discolored; one eye was closed in a rim of crimson; his mouth was dribbling blood; sawdust and filth befouled his clothes, and a stench of vile whisky exhaled from him like a nauseating steam. He was helped over to a sofa, and allowed to collapse, while the men hurried away as though ashamed of their task, and thankful to have done with it.