The Socialist Part 21

"He has given me his promise," Mary answered, "that he comes merely as an interested spectator."

"Oh, well, then," Flood answered, "if that is the case, by all means let him come, Miss Marriott. Of course, if Rose does not mind, I am sure I don't; but when you first mentioned his name I had a flitting vision that he was coming for--not at all in a friendly way--in fact, to gather material for a libel action in case his personality is indicated too plainly in the play."

"But it is not, Mr. Flood, is it?" Mary asked.

"Oh, no," the actor answered; "his personality is not indicated at all.

We don't caricature people, we indicate types. He is---- Well, perhaps I should hardly even have used the word indicate at all--he is merely used as a peg upon which to hang our theories. I have read the play and you have not, and I am sure that what I say is quite correct. At the same time, you know, Miss Marriott, all London will guess at whom we are hitting in the first instance--not so much because he happens to be an individual enemy of the Cause as that he is representative of the army of monopolists we are endeavouring to destroy."

"I am sure he won't mind at all," Mary Marriott said, and Flood noticed with an odd uneasiness that she flushed a little. "I have had the privilege of seeing something of the duke lately, and he really seems to be taking an interest in the socialistic movement, though of course from quite a different point of view to ours."

"I see," Flood replied slowly. "Miss Marriott, you are trying----" And then he stopped, he thought it better to leave his thought unspoken.

"Very well, then," he replied, "so be it. Bring him, by all means."

"May I telephone?" Mary said, "or, rather would you have a message telephoned to Grosvenor Street, Mr. Flood? The duke is staying with Lord Camborne, and I promised that if it was possible for him to hear the reading of the play I would let him know. If you telephone to him that there is no objection he will arrive here at half-past two o'clock."

"By all means," Flood answered, "I will do it myself. I have had a good many interesting experiences in my lifetime, but this will be the first time that I have talked to a duke over the telephone." He laughed a little sardonically as Mary rose.

"By the way, what are you going to do now?" he said.

"It is nearly one o'clock. I am going home to my flat for lunch," Mary answered.

"No, you are not, Miss Marriott," he answered. "You are coming out to lunch with me, if you please."

Mary hesitated for a moment, then smiled radiantly, and thanked him. "It is very kind of you," she said. "Of course I will, since you ask me."

Together, a few minutes afterwards, they left the theatre and drove down to Frascati's.

The lunch was bright and merry. Upon the stage the usual convenances are not observed, because, indeed, it would be impossible that they should be. Apart from them any abuses of stage life, and the danger which belongs to the meeting of youngish men and women without the usual restraints of society, without the usual restraints which society imposes, there is, nevertheless, in many instances a real and true _camaraderie_ of the s.e.xes which is as charming as it is without offence.

The girl lunched with the actor-manager, gaily and happily. The simple _omelette_, _fines herbes_, the red mullet and the grilled kidneys were perfectly cooked, and the bottle of Beaune--well, it was Moulin a Vent, and what more can be said?

They talked over the play from various points of view. First of all it was from the aspect of its probable success. They agreed that this seemed a.s.sured. Then they talked eagerly, keenly of the artistic possibilities of it. Mary had read a scene or two--Fabian Rose had given her the typewritten ma.n.u.script--but of the play as a whole she had no more than a vague idea. This, to both of them, was the most interesting part of their talk.

Aubrey was an artist in every way. He was a successful artist and had combined commercial success with his real work, otherwise he would not have been a "successful artist." But he cared very much, nevertheless, for the splendour of what he believed to be the greatest art in the world. He was sincere, as Mary was also, in his belief in the high mission of the stage.

Finally, over their coffee, they talked of what the play--already a.s.sumed successful and important--would mean to Socialism.

Mary was but a new convert. Her ideas about the cause to which, in her young enthusiasm, she had pledged herself were nebulous. She had much to learn. She was learning much. Yet her heart warmed up as Aubrey Flood let his words go, and told her of his ambitions that this play should indeed be a great thing for the Cause. He was a clever and well-known actor, a successful manager, under a new aspect altogether. She had met people like Aubrey Flood before, but no single one of them had ever shown her that beneath his life of the theatre lay any deep and underlying motive, and it uplifted her, she felt that strange sense of brotherhood which those who are united against the world always know.

She recognised that Aubrey Flood, beneath his exterior, was as keen and convinced a Socialist as Fabian Rose, or Mr. Conrad. The fact substantiated her own new theories and induced in her the throbbing sense of being an officer in a great army.

"I wish I had known before," she said to him as they were preparing to leave the restaurant. "I wish I had known before, then, indeed, I might have had an ethical motive in my life, which I now see and feel has been lacking for a long time."

"You are now," he answered, "catching something of our own enthusiasm, and it is by the most extraordinary chain of events that Rose and you, Conrad and myself have come into touch with the Duke of Paddington himself. Conrad, of course, would tell you that Providence had designed it. I cannot go so far as that. I simply say that it is chance. All the same, it is a most marvellous thing. We are going to startle England."

Mary looked at him for a moment. They had just got into the hansom which was to drive them back to the theatre.

"I don't see, Mr. Flood," she said in a quiet voice, "why it is any more easy to believe that something you call 'chance' brings things about than it is difficult to believe that something Mr. Conrad calls 'Providence' should effect the same results."

Flood looked at her in his turn. Here was a most strange young lady of the stage, indeed. He tried to think of something to say, but could not. The simple logic of her answer forbade retort.

Indeed, why should any one want to gather up "coincidences," call the controlling power of them "chance," and not admit that Providence itself had ordered them?

He could not think beyond that, and he was silent. He remembered his old father at the country rectory. He remembered the simple faith of his father and mother and his sisters, and he realised with a sudden shock of pain that the reason why he strove to call the strange Directors.h.i.+p of the affairs of life by a name which had no especial meaning was because he was not prepared to submit to the teachings and the order of the Faith.

Mary also seemed to realise that her words had struck home to a heart which was not yet entirely atrophied by the rush of life in the world of the stage.

She turned to him and smiled slightly, rather sadly, indeed.

"Mr. Flood," she said, "you and I were both born in the same country but perhaps you have been over the frontier for a long time."

"And perhaps," he answered, and while he did so his voice sounded in his own ears strange and unfamiliar, "and perhaps even a theatrical manager may some day ask for his pa.s.sport to return."

They drew up at the stage door of the Park Lane Theatre.

Mary did not go back to Mr. Flood's room. She went straight on to the stage. The curtain was up. The house was swathed in brown holland, and only a faint light came down from the gla.s.s dome in the roof, showing the whole place melancholy and bizarre. The stage itself was a great expanse of dirty boards, stretching right away to a brick wall at the back, in which was a huge slit, with two dingily-painted doors covering it, by which scenery was brought into the scene-dock a little behind.

Two or three chairs were set down by the unlighted footlights, and there was a tiny table by one of them. The limits of the scene which would be set one day were marked off by chalk lines upon the boards. Two or three nondescript men in soft felt hats wandered about in the wings, and on the prompt side, up a ladder and standing on the platform above where is the switchboard which controls the stage lights, the electrician--in a dirty white linen coat--was twisting wires from one plug to another, and noisily whistling the last popular song.

It was a scene of drab materialism, and the two or three little groups of people who stood here and there neither added to it nor gave it any animation.

As Mary went "on" the actors and actresses who were waiting there looked at her with curious eyes. One or two she knew--they were often at the Actors' a.s.sociation. Who her colleagues as princ.i.p.als were she had not been told, and as yet had no idea, save only of course that she was to act with Aubrey Flood himself.

She saw, however, with a little thrill of pleasure that Dorothy French was there. She herself had obtained a small part for her little friend from Fabian Rose. Dolly came hurrying up to her, the girl's high-heeled shoes echoing strangely upon the boards and sending out a m.u.f.fled drum-like note into the dim, shrouded auditorium beyond.

"Oh, Mary dear," Dolly whispered, "I am so glad to see you! I have not seen you for such a long time, and it's been so awfully good of you to find a shop for me. But what an extraordinary business it all is! None of us seem to know anything about it. The whole thing is a perfect mystery, and is it really true?" she continued, with a touch of envy, "is it really true, Mary dear, that you are going to play lead?"

Mary sighed a little. "Well," she said, "I suppose it is."

"Then you know all about it?" Dolly answered quickly. "Now, do tell me, Mary, what it is all about. The papers are full of rumours."

Mary realised what she had often realised before in her stage career, that friends.h.i.+ps last for a tour, and are spoiled by the first hintings of success. She had always been fond of little Dolly French, pretty little Dolly French; but here at the very first intimation of her own promotion, was Dolly, with a changed voice and a different look in her eyes, wearing an eager, questioning envious look.

"I know very little, Dolly," she answered rather shortly, "and what I do know I must not tell. Everybody will know soon, of course."

Dorothy looked at her for a moment in silence. Then she said: "Oh, Mary!

I see that you are already feeling the responsibilities of being Lead."

She t.i.ttered rather bitterly, turned away, and rejoined the group from which she had come.

Every one seemed to watch Mary for a few moments--she was standing quite by herself--when there was a noise of footsteps and a group of people came through the pa.s.s-door and down the three or four steps which led to the stage itself.

Aubrey Flood was the first, without a hat and in an ordinary lounge suit. James Fabian Rose, carrying a roll of brown paper in his hand, and wearing a tweed overcoat and soft felt hat, followed him.

Behind the two was another man, who walked close to the pioneers, and looked round him with an air of unfamiliarity.

He was a tallish, clean-shaven young man who wore a heavy fur coat.

Mary turned round and went up to the group.