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Page 21
And it was Spring: the tenth Spring P. Sybarite had watched from that
self-same spot.
Discontent bred in him a brooding despondency. He felt quite sure that
the realists were right about Life: it wasn't worth living, after all.
The prospect of the theatre lost its attraction. He was sure he
wouldn't enjoy it. Such silly romantical nonsense was out of tune with
the immortal Truth about Things, which he had just discovered: Life
was a poor Joke....
At his side, George Bross, on his behalf, was nursing his private and
personal grouch. Between them they manufactured an atmosphere of gloom
that would have done credit to a brace of dumb Socialists.
But presently Miss Prim and Miss Lessing appeared, and changed all
that in a twinkling.
VII
AFTERMATH
"Well," observed Violet generously, "I thought little me was pretty
well stage-broke; but I gotta hand it to Otis. He's _some_ actor. He
had me going from the first snore."
"Some actor is _right_," affirmed Mr. Bross with conviction, "and some
show, too, if you wanta know. I could sit through it twicet. Say, I
couldn't quit thinkin' what a grand young time I'd start in this old
burg if I could only con this _Kismet_ thing into slippin' me _my_ Day
of Days. Believe me or not, there would be _a_ party."
"What would you do?" asked Molly Lessing, smiling.
"Well, the first flop I'd nail down all the coin that was handy, and
then I'd buy me a flock of automobiles--and have a table reserved for
me at the Knickerbocker for dinner every night--and...." Imagination
flagged. "Well," he concluded defensively, "I can tell you one thing I
wouldn't do."
"What?" demanded Violet.
"I wouldn't let any ward politician like that there _Wazir_, or
whatever them A-rabs called him, kid me into trying to throw a bomb at
Charlie Murphy--or anythin' like that. No-oh! Not this infant. That's
where your friend _Hajj the Beggar's_ foot slipped on him. Up to then
he had everythin' his own way. If he'd only had sense enough to stall,
he'd've wound up in a blaze of glory."
"But, you bonehead," Violet argued candidly, "he had to. That was his
part: it was written in the play."
"G'wan. If he'd just stalled round and refused to jump through, the
author'd 've framed up some other way out. Why--blame it!--he'd've
_had_ to!"
"That will be about all for me," said Violet. "I don't feel strong
enough to-night to stand any more of your dramatic criticism. Lead me
home--and please talk baseball all the way."
With a resentful grunt, Mr. Bross clamped a warm, moist hand round the
plump arm of his charmer, and with masterful address propelled her
from the curb in front of the theatre, where the little party had
paused, to the northwest corner of Broadway: their progress consisting
in a series of frantic rushes broken by abrupt pauses to escape
annihilation in the roaring after-theatre crush of motor-cars. P.
Sybarite, moving instinctively to follow, leaped back to the sidewalk
barely in time to save his toes a crushing beneath the tires of a
hurtling taxicab.
He smiled a furtive apology at Molly Lessing, who had demonstrated
greater discretion, and she returned his smile in the friendliest
manner. His head was buzzing--and her eyes were kind. Neither spoke;
but for an instant he experienced a breathless sense of sympathetic
isolation with her, there on that crowded corner, elbowed and
shouldered in the eddy caused by the junction of the outpouring
audience with the midnight tides of wayfarers surging north and south.
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