The Foolish Lovers Part 12

IV

"You never told me your name," he said, when she returned with the plate of cakes.

"Give a guess!" she teased.

He looked at her for a moment. "Maggie!" he said.

"How did you know?"

"I didn't know," he answered. "You look like a Maggie. What's your other name?"

"Carmichael!"

"Maggie Carmichael!" he exclaimed. "It's a nice name!"

"I'm glad you like it," she said.

V

He sat back in his chair while she went to prepare for the theatre. How lucky it was that he had asked his Uncle William for more money that morning "in case I need it!" If he had not done so, he would not have been able to offer to take Maggie to the theatre.... They would go in by the Early Door. There was certain to be a crowd outside the ordinary door on a Sat.u.r.day night. What a piece of luck it was that he had chosen to take his tea in this place instead of the restaurant to which he usually went. Mrs. Bothwell's headache, too, that was a piece of luck, for him, although not, perhaps, for her. He liked the look of Maggie. He liked her bright face and her laugh and her beautiful, golden hair. What was that bit again?

_In Belmont is a lady richly left, And she is fair and fairer than that word Of wondrous virtue...._

and then again:

_...and her sunny locks Hang on her temples like a golden fleece._

Maggie came out of the small room, ready for the street, and he sat and watched her as she shut the door behind her.

"I believe I'm in love," he said to himself. "I believe I am!"

"Are you ready?" he said aloud.

"I've only to draw the blinds and then lock the door!" she replied.

"I'll draw them for you," he said, going over to the windows and drawing down the blinds as he spoke. "Did you ever see _The Merchant of Venice_?" he asked when he had done so.

"No," she said.

"There's a bit in it that makes me think of you," he went on.

"Oh, now, don't start plastering me," she exclaimed gaily.

"I mean it," he said, and he quoted the lines about Portia's sunny locks.

"That's poetry." she said.

"It is!" he replied.

"It's queer and nice!"

She opened the door leading to the stairs, and then went back to the room to turn out the light. The room was in semi-darkness, save where a splash of yellow light from the staircase fell at the doorway.

He turned towards her as she made her way to the door, and put out his hand to her. She took hold of it, and as she did so, he caught her quickly to him and drew her into his arms and kissed her soft, warm lips.

"You're an awful wee fellow," she said, freeing herself from his embrace and smiling at him.

He did not answer her, but his heart was singing inside him. _I love her. I know I love her. I love her. I love her. I know I love her._

They went down the stairs together, and as they emerged into the street, he put his arm in hers and drew, her close to him. Almost he wished that they were not going to the theatre, that they might walk like this, arm in arm, for the remainder of the evening. He could still feel the warmth of her lips on his, and he wished that they could go to some quiet place so that he might kiss her again. But he had asked her to go to the theatre, and he did not wish to disappoint her. They entered the theatre by the Early Door, and sat in the middle of the front row of the pit. There was a queer silence in the theatre, for the ordinary doors had not yet opened, and the occasional murmur of a voice echoed oddly. John put his arm in Maggie's and wound his fingers in hers, and felt the pressure of her hand against his hand. When the ordinary doors of the theatre were opened and the crowd came pouring in, he hardly seemed aware of the people searching for good seats.

Maggie had tried to withdraw her hand from his when she heard the noise of the people hurrying down the stone steps, but he had not released her, and she had remained content. And so they sat while the theatre quickly filled. Presently an attendant with programmes and chocolates came towards them, and he purchased a box of chocolates for her.

"You shouldn't have done that," she said, making the polite protest.

"I've always heard girls are fond of sweeties," he replied.

He put the box of chocolates in her lap, and opened the programme and handed it to her.

"It's a long piece," she said, "with a whole lot of acts and scenes in it. That's the sort of piece I like ... with a whole lot of changes in it!"

"Do you?" he said.

"Yes. I came here one time to see a piece that was greatly praised in the _Whig_ and the _Newsletter_, and do you know they used the same scene in every act! I thought it was a poor miserly sort of a play. The bills said it was a London company, but I don't believe that was true. They were just letting on to be from London. They couldn't have had much money behind them when they couldn't afford more nor the one scene, could they!"

"Mebbe you're right," he answered.

The members of the orchestra came into the theatre, and after a while the music began. The lights in the theatre were diminished and then were extinguished, and the curtain went up. John snuggled closer to Maggie.

VI

He was scarcely aware of the performance on the stage, so aware was he of the nearness of Maggie. He heard applause, but he did not greatly heed it. He was in love. He had never been in love before, and he had always thought of it as something very different from this, something cold and austere and aloof, and very dignified ... not at all like this warm, intimate, careless thing. He slipped his hand from Maggie's and slowly put his arm round her waist. She did not resist him, and when he drew her more closely to him so that their heads were nearly touching, she yielded to him without demur. He could feel her heart beating where his hand pressed against her side, and he heard the slow rise and fall of her breath as she inhaled and exhaled. He could not get near enough to her. He wanted to draw her head down on to his shoulder, to put both his arms about her, to feel again his lips on her lips....

He started suddenly. Someone was tapping him, on the shoulder. He turned round to meet the gaze of an elderly, indignant woman who was seated immediately behind him.

"Sit still," she said in a loud whisper. "I can't see the stage for you two ducking your heads together!"

VII

He took his arm away from Maggie's waist, and edged a little away from her. He felt angry and humiliated. He told himself that he did not care who saw him putting his arm about Maggie's waist, but was aware that this was not true, that he deeply resented being overlooked in his love-making. He did not wish anyone to behold him in this intimate relationship with Maggie, and he was full of fury against the woman behind him because she had seen him fondling her. For of course the woman knew that he had his arm about Maggie ... and now her neighbours would know, too. The whole theatre would know that he had been embracing the girl!... Well, what if they did know? Let them know!

There was no harm in a fellow putting his arm round a girl's waist. It was a natural thing for a fellow to do, particularly if the girl were so pretty and warm and loving as Maggie Carmichael. The woman herself had no doubt had a man's arm round her waist once upon a time. He did not care who knew!... All the same!... No, he did not care!... He slipped his hand into Maggie's hand again, and then quickly withdrew it. She was holding a sticky chocolate in her fingers!...

He lost all interest in the play now. It would be truer, perhaps, to say that he had not begun to be interested in it, and now that he tried to follow it, he could not do so. His mind constantly reverted to the indignant woman behind him. He imagined her looking, first this way and then that, in her efforts to see the stage, getting angrier and more angry as she was thwarted in her desire, and then, in her final indignation, leaning forward to tap on his shoulder and beg him to keep his head apart from Maggie's so that she might conveniently see the stage. His sense of violated privacy became stronger. His love for Maggie, for he accepted it now as a settled fact, was not a thing for prying eyes to witness: it was a secret, intimate thing in which she and he alone were concerned. He hated the thought that anyone else in the theatre should know that Maggie and he were sweethearts, newly in love and warm with the glow of their first affection. And then, when he had slipped his hand back into hers, he had encountered a sticky chocolate! While he was burning with feeling for her and with resentment against the old woman's intrusion into their love affair, Maggie had been chewing chocolate quite unconcernedly. In that crisis of their love, she had remained unmoved. When he had released her hand, she had simply put it into the box of chocolates and taken out a sticky sweet and had eaten it with as little emotion as if he had not been present at all, as if his ardent, pressing arm had not been suddenly withdrawn from her waist because of that angry intruder into their happiness. She had taken his hand when he gave it to her, and had released it again when he withdrew it, without any appearance of desire or reluctance. He had imagined that she would take his hand eagerly and yield it up unwillingly, that she would try to restrain him when he endeavoured to take his hand away from hers ... but she had not done so.