"A new play by Sidney Cremer ought to be a draw even here," said Lillie, "and 'Lord Bob' is _bran_ new--as new as tomorrow's bread."

"Lord Bob," by Sidney Cremer: Loveland remembered seeing the posters up in New York, and for the last year or two the young American playwright's name had been well known even in London. This piece Loveland believed had been produced for the very first time on his first night in New York. Yet these barn-stormers had got hold of it!

He made some remark that showed surprise, and Lillie, laughing rather sadly, replied that a New York man with whom J. J. was in touch had offered to give him the play cheap. "We don't pay the author anything,"

she said. "Seems mean, doesn't it?--and I suppose it's a kind of stealing. But I've been brought up to it, ever since I was a 'pro'; and we don't hurt the playwright much by producing his pieces in places like our week stands. No company that pays author's fees comes here once in a blue moon. The question is, could we put the play on, and could we get the Opera House for any nights this week? It was Jacobus who knew all those things, not me. I was in his hands, and I just let myself drift."

"There are only three women--two girls, and an old lady in the play.

That would suit all right," said Eddy, eagerly. "As for the men, it isn't quite so easy--never is; but there are only five. One's a servant, another a policeman; and there's no scenery to speak of. I guess we could fake. I don't feel very grand, but I'll try and write out the rest of the parts by tonight, in case we can get the theatre, and bring the stunt off."

"I'll write out the parts you haven't done," said Loveland. "I'll find the manager of the alleged Opera House, too, and have a talk with him."

"Do. A real heart to heart talk," urged Lillie. "Tell him we mean sharing terms, of course. If it really can be fixed up, it's pretty sure the landlord'll keep us all on spec."

Loveland, who was now the only able-bodied young man of the party, and whose idea it had been to get up the entertainment, went out at once, luckily catching the local manager of the grandiloquently named Opera House, just as he was virtuously setting forth to church.

Jacobus, it seemed, had "settled up all right" with him the night before, and he was surprised to hear of the flight. But he had his bride--a third bride--with him, and feared that she would not consider it decorous to discuss theatrical business in the street, on Sunday, on the way to church. He would have sent the "show man" away rather cavalierly without any definite answer if the bride, who, like an intelligent baby, was already beginning to "take notice," had not put in a word for the handsome young Englishman.

"I don't care if we are five minutes late," said she, conscious of a hat which would receive the more appreciation if all the other hats were already in their pews.

So the manager relented, and admitted to Loveland that the "house" was "open" for three nights. After that, the Dandy Lady Minstrels were coming to finish out the week. Their advance agent would arrive on Monday, without doubt, and "bill the town," so that a makeshift show wouldn't stand much chance. As the Opera House was free, however, the marooned actors might have their chance, but it was a "spec" for him--the manager--and ordinary sharing terms weren't good enough. He stipulated for two thirds of the profits, if any, above expenses, and would not unbend, though the bride motioned her compa.s.sion for the actors, with lifted eyebrows.

All the rest of the day, Loveland was busy. He finished copying the parts, which must be learned and rehea.r.s.ed, so that the play might be produced tomorrow night.

There was a newspaper in Ashville, which came out once a week; and the company decided, after a stormy debate, to spend one of the six dollars in buying from the office large sheets or rolls of the coa.r.s.e white paper on which this weekly publication was printed. Having secured a good supply, and obtained black paint and a big brush from a sympathetic sign-painter, who was a customer of the hotel, Loveland set to work, with Binney's aid and direction, to manufacture some crude posters.

He announced in black letters, so gigantic as to be almost convincing, that the princ.i.p.al members of the Little Human Flower's All Star Company had been persuaded to remain for a special three nights' engagement, in order to produce the sparkling comedy, "Lord Bob," New York's Latest and Biggest Success, by the popular playwright, Sidney Cremer.

At least a dozen duplicates of this announcement he produced, after hours of painstaking labour, which cost him a cramp in his right hand, if not in his temper.

It really was nervous work for an amateur, drawing out and s.p.a.cing the huge letters with pencil, then filling them in with thick splashes of black paint--especially as the paper was thin, sometimes letting the big brush break through, and costing another sheet, another hour's toil. But it was extraordinary how much interest Loveland took in his self-appointed task, how easily controlled was his impulse to be cross when Ed Binney or "Pa" Winter interrupted him with a suggestion.

He felt that the company's present plight had been brought about partly by him; through his friendship with Lillie (how could Miss Moon guess it was for Bill's sake?) and his thoughtless promise of secrecy. Therefore he was inclined to do his best to atone; and the _blase_ young soldier who once had thought all work and most pleasures a bore, toiled like a slave through a whole day and half a night to save Ed Binney fatigue.

After midnight, when the impromptu posters were ready, Loveland and "Pa"

Winter went out together with big rolls of paper under their arms, and a huge pot of flour paste, stirred up (for the sake of Gordon's _beaux yeux_) by the hand of the landlord's niece, over the kitchen fire.

They had no right to "grab s.p.a.ces," Pa Winter pointed out; and if they put up the new paper on top of the old the agent of the "Dandy Lady Minstrels" would ruthlessly cause it to be covered over with his own bills. Still, despite these pessimistic prophecies, Loveland distributed the advertis.e.m.e.nts of "Lord Bob" as well as he could, hoping for the mercy or the negligence of the coming rival.

What remained of the night he spent in committing to memory the part of "Lord Bob," for which, without a dissenting voice, the five other members of the company had cast him.

It was a part which a London or New York leading man would have studied for two weeks, rehea.r.s.ed for three, and finally played with joy mingled with misgiving. But Loveland could not afford artistic scruples. The play was the thing, and the acting must take care of itself.

They went out to rehearsal early next morning, and were thankful that there had been neither rain nor snow to destroy the fragile posters. In front of one which Loveland had put up on the face of the Opera House, stood a girl and an old man, talking in low voices.

"They're reading about the play and making up their minds to come,"

muttered Loveland to Lillie de Lisle, with whom he had walked to the theatre. As he spoke, the pair turned and stared sharply for an instant at the actor and actress. Loveland was disappointed. After all, they did not look like the sort of persons who would care to attend a performance given by barn-stormers. The girl was a lady, the man a gentleman. They were well dressed, their faces had a cultivated expression, indescribable yet unmistakable. Altogether, they were of a different order from the people who had composed the audiences at the Opera House during the past week.

"I shall certainly write and tell them what's going on," remarked the girl to her companion, who was probably her father. "It's a shame.

Something ought to be done."

"We might telegraph, if you think it would be worth while," replied the old man.

Loveland heard the words, spoken as the pair turned away to walk down the street, towards the residence part of the town, but he attached no importance to the disjointed sentences. The affairs of the Human Flower Company were occupying his mind for the moment, to the exclusion of all else. He was not even thinking of lost Lesley Dearmer, or wondering whether there would be a letter from his mother forwarded by Bill to Bonnerstown this week.

Everybody was in deadly earnest, and the rehearsal went off very well, considering all its disadvantages. They had another in the afternoon; and by that time, they learned joyfully, a few seats had actually been booked in advance.

Ed Binney's cough had not improved, but he was kept up on strong, hot coffee, and they got through the performance that night, two men short, almost without a hitch. Nevertheless, though "Lord Bob" was a great New York success, as Sidney Cremer's comedies always were, and bristled with brilliant scenes and bright dialogue, it was a little above the heads of an average Ashville audience.

A few well, though plainly, dressed ladies and gentlemen were in the front seats, and all seemed to know each other, laughing and talking together between the acts; and among them, through a peephole in the curtain, Loveland recognised the nice-looking girl and old man he had seen staring at his home-made poster in the morning. The rest of the audience, however, were of the usual sort, and preferred wild melodrama to sparkling light comedy.

The profits of the first performance, and the next, were not what Val had expected, though the acting of the company improved; but on the last night Loveland tried to hope that Ashville would turn out in full force.

Having set the first scene himself, in default of a stage manager or competent stage hands, he applied an anxious eye to a small "spy-hole"

in the curtain, and peeped out.

His heart sank. The house was half empty. But it was early still. There was hope yet. People were coming in. There was the old gentleman and the girl he had seen before, finding their way once more to the front seats.

Someone was with them; they were bringing guests. That looked encouraging!

Val lingered at the "spy-hole."

The girl and her father sat down.

With them were Lesley Dearmer and her aunt, Mrs. Loveland.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

Pirates!

For an instant Val thought of nothing but the heavenly surprise of seeing the girl he loved.

Recognition brought a shock of joy, and a wave of love which had been held in check for a time by the weight of misfortune, as the waters of a stormy river in flood are held back by the shut gates of a lock. He had known that he loved her, too well for peace of mind, more pa.s.sionately and purely than he had thought it was in him to love. But until he saw her face looking up, as if at him, yet unconscious of his gaze--the dear, charming face he had longed for through all his miseries, scarcely dreaming ever to see her again--he had not realised how utterly precious it was, how entirely indispensable in his life.

A wild impulse rushed over him to call her name--"Lesley--Lesley!" and spring from behind the curtain, as if they two were alone together in a world of their own. But after the first luminous instant, the joy of her presence was blotted out in darkness.

He remembered everything; remembered that he was Perceval Gordon, an actor of the submerged tenth, a wretched, penniless barn-stormer, who for the moment came near to being an object of charity.

When he had bidden Lesley goodbye, he was a splendid being who looked down from his heights, and, though loving her, saw her impossible as a wife. Their friendship had begun by being somewhat of a condescension on his part--from his own point of view, at least; and she, half amused, half angry, had seen that point of view quite clearly, nor had she ever attempted to change it, to the last.

At the thought that the curtain would ring up and show him as he was now, to the astonished eyes of Lesley Dearmer, he could have run away, out of the theatre, anywhere--it mattered not where--if only she need not see him, need not know that the magnificent Lord Loveland and the miserable P. Gordon were one.

His blood surged up to his head, throbbing in his temples, and tingling in his ears, but through the confusion of his senses penetrated the knowledge that he could not go.

This trial of endurance--it seemed to him the hardest of all the ordeals he had been forced to face during that fortnight which was a decade--he would have to go through, as he had gone through the others; because, to evade it, he must be worse than a coward. He would be coward and traitor as well; and under all his faults there was something which would not let him be traitor or coward.

Selfish he had been, but the sh.e.l.l of his selfishness had been broken by many hard knocks, and the real self, once so comfortably housed within, was finding itself, though all a-shiver still with the cold.