The Dual Alliance Part 15

She nodded.

"I'll find time."

Sunday she left for a month's absence. In a way she was glad to go. She realized that she needed time and solitude to think out several problems that confronted her. First and most important, she wanted to discover just how much of a part Paul Trent had come to play in her days. Removed entirely from the influence of his personality, she intended to free herself from him, look at him, and at herself impersonally.

He had rushed away from a meeting to put her on the train, and his farewell had been as casual as if she were going to Brooklyn for the evening. It had piqued her a bit. Then angry at herself that she had wanted him anything but casual, she had punished him with an indifference which a more astute student of women would have detected at once as over played.

She sighed over the growing complexity of the situation. Why could it not always be as simple and natural as it had been in the mountains?

Monday was too busy for thoughts, rehearsal in the new theatre, getting settled in the new hotel, followed by a first night as climax.

When she arrived at the theatre she found her dressing-room full of Killarney roses, with a telegram from Paul: "Irish roses have to do. I wish I could fill the room with mountain laurel."

She was both touched and pleased. She knew he had taken time and thought from his busy day, and it gave her a thrill of happiness. It was enough to key her performance to a high note of joy which her audience felt at once. She was gladsome youth and daring, and she danced into their hearts, just as she had into the more hospitable affections of Broadway.

There was no withstanding her. It was a triumph.

Later when the manager came to her room to congratulate her, she said: "Yes, they liked me, but I'm not going to extend the run."

"Why not, if the money's rolling in?"

"I don't care if it is. I want to get back to New York."

"You Irish are all crazy!" he remarked, with the Hebraic patience of one whose G.o.ds are all outraged. "She don't care for money, she likes New York," he mocked her.

Her friends came back in numbers after the play. She was invited to sup, to dine, to play bridge, to take tea. She refused to go anywhere until she was rested after the strain of the first night, and when they had all departed, she hurried into her street clothes. All at once it came to her that there was no need of this rush. Paul would not be pacing the corridor to-night. With a sigh and a sudden acute sense of loneliness, she led the way to the hotel.

As she stopped for her key the clerk told her that New York would call her at midnight. She hurried to her room, her heart beating, and as she opened the door the telephone rang. She flew to it.

"Yes, yes, _Paul_!" she said, and scarcely knew her own voice. "Yes, great success. I was wonderful, thanks to you ... yes, I was so happy about the flowers and the telegram; it sang in my playing. Tell me about your day. What happened?" She listened attentively. "Everything all right, then. Empty?... You mean you miss me? I can't be sorry for that, Playmate."

They talked on for several minutes. When good-nights were said, Bob crossed the room to lay off her cloak, smiling. She caught sight of herself in the mirror.

"Why, Barbara Garratry," she said, staring at herself. "How can you look like that after a Boston opening?" Then she laughed.

Friends absolutely closed in on her after the first few days. She had all she could do to protect herself.

The days were crowded with little things, people and teas. She found herself too restless to work. She could not a.n.a.lyze her state of mind at all. Nothing interested her, people seemed unusually stupid and bromidic, she lost interest in the play she was writing and found the one she was playing a bore. She knew that her health was perfect and she could not make it out.

In her search for something to divert her mind and serve as an escape from over-devoted admirers, she discovered a public munic.i.p.al bath house, where she could go to swim. Clad in the shapeless blue garment provided by the bath house--Bob called it "the democratic toga"--she would shut her eyes and dive off the spring board, pretending that she was going into the mountain pool in the dark. The strength she had stored up in the hills stood her in good stead for the swimming races.

Pauline, as she taught the girls to call her, was always, or nearly always, winner.

n.o.body suspected who she was, and she found great amus.e.m.e.nt in the occasional outburst of some matinee adorer, in regard to the charms of Bob Garratry. She heard marvellous yarns about herself, her unhappy marriage, her large group of children, her many lovers.

"No, I haven't seen the lady," she answered one of them, "but I'll wager I can beat her swimming fifty yards."

"Oh, she wouldn't _swim_!" protested the girl.

"Wouldn't she? Poor sort, then," said "Pauline," trying the Australian Crawl.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "Every night at midnight Paul called her on the 'phone"]

Every night at midnight Paul called her on the 'phone, and this was the one vital hour of her day. He kept her as closely in touch with his campaigning as she had been in New York. In return he demanded news of her doings, her successes, and her friends. He announced that he was to go on a trip through the state, lasting a week, and she lamented to herself that their visits would cease, but he called her just the same from the different towns.

One afternoon she sauntered down the hall to her room, after a series of alleged pleasures, including luncheon and two teas. She was tired and she vowed to herself that this was her last day of killing time.

To-morrow she would force herself to work. She opened the door and was halfway across the room before she saw him smiling at her from the hearthrug. Her hand went to her heart swiftly as he came toward her, both hands out.

"Barbara!"

"Paul! But how--when----"

"I ran away! We were in a town where we were to have a meeting. I was to be the main speaker. I don't know what happened to me: I just found myself on a train coming here, and here I am."

He held her two hands and looked at her intently.

"But how long have you been here? Why didn't you let me know?"

"I wanted to surprise you. I've been pacing this room for one hour in punishment."

"Oh, I'm sorry.... You're very thin and overworked, Governor."

"I know it. The strain is over soon now, thank Heaven. But you--it's you I want to hear about; it's you I want to see, and listen to."

He helped her with her coat, placed her chair, and when she was seated, he stood looking at her.

"You think I've changed?" she smiled at him.

"I never can remember how you look. It tantalizes me."

"Oh, didn't I leave you any pictures?"

"Pictures! I don't want any Miss Barbara Garratry advertis.e.m.e.nts. I know how she looks. It's _you_ I can't remember. You've had a big success here. Does it make you happy?"

She shook her head.

"Why not?"

"No fight--too easy. That's one of my troubles: there seems to be so little for me to fight for in my work. Lord! that sounds self-satisfied.

I don't mean it that way. I mean that developing as an artist is a peaceful process, rather. The days when I had to fight for my chance, fight for my part, fight the stage manager to let me do it my way, fight the audience to make it like me--oh, those were the days that counted!

Daddy and I used to talk things over nights. He was cautious. He'd say: 'Well, ye' lose yer job if you do that,' but when I had done it, he used to laugh and say: 'Bob, son av battle, shure enough'."

Paul laughed.

"The dulness of being successful! There's something in it, Bob."

"Of course there is. Report on your week, sir."

"Well, the boys say it went all right, but I didn't seem to have my heart in it. I've been so restless, so sort of bored with people and things. I can't get down to work. I even find myself thinking of what I am going to say to you over the telephone, right in the middle of a speech, with a big audience out there in front of me."

Barbara laughed.