The Ghost: A Modern Fantasy Part 2

"It's a treat to see any one enjoy anything as you enjoy this music,"

she said to me. She spoke well, perhaps rather too carefully, and with a hint of the c.o.c.kney accent.

"It runs in the family, you know, Mrs. Smith," I replied, blus.h.i.+ng for the ingenuousness which had pleased her.

"Don't call me Mrs. Smith; call me Emmeline, as we are cousins. I shouldn't at all like it if I mightn't call you Carl. Carl is such a handsome name, and it suits you. Now, doesn't it, Sully?"

"Yes, darling," Sullivan answered nonchalantly. He was at the back of the box, and clearly it was his benevolent desire to give me fair opportunity of a tete-a-tete with his dark and languorous lady.

Unfortunately, I was quite unpractised in the art of maintaining a tete-a-tete with dark and languorous ladies. Presently he rose.

"I must look up Smart," he said, and left us.

"Sullivan has been telling me about you. What a strange meeting! And so you are a doctor! You don't know how young you look. Why, I am old enough to be your mother!"

"Oh, no, you aren't," I said. At any rate, I knew enough to say that.

And she smiled.

"Personally," she went on, "I hate music--loathe it. But it's Sullivan's trade, and, of course, one must come here."

She waved a jewelled arm towards the splendid animation of the auditorium.

"But surely, Emmeline," I cried protestingly, "you didn't 'loathe'

that first act. I never heard anything like it. Rosa was simply--well, I can't describe it."

She gazed at me, and a cloud of melancholy seemed to come into her eyes. And after a pause she said, in the strangest tone, very quietly:

"You're in love with her already."

And her eyes continued to hold mine.

"Who could help it?" I laughed.

She leaned towards me, and her left hand hung over the edge of the box.

"Women like Rosetta Rosa ought to be killed!" she said, with astonis.h.i.+ng ferocity. Her rich, heavy contralto vibrated through me.

She was excited again, that was evident. The nervous mood had overtaken her. The long pendent lobes of her ears crimsoned, and her opulent bosom heaved. I was startled. I was rather more than startled--I was frightened. I said to myself, "What a peculiar creature!"

"Why?" I questioned faintly.

"Because they are too young, too lovely, too dangerous," she responded with fierce emphasis. "And as for Rosa in particular--as for Rosa in particular--if you knew what I knew, what I've seen----"

"What have you seen?" I was bewildered. I began to wish that Sullivan had not abandoned me to her.

"Perhaps I'm wrong," she laughed.

She laughed, and sat up straight again, and resumed her excellent imitation of the woman of fas.h.i.+on, while I tried to behave as though I had found nothing singular in her behavior.

"You know about our reception?" she asked vivaciously in another moment, playing with her fan.

"I'm afraid I don't."

"Where have you been, Carl?"

"I've been in Edinburgh," I said, "for my final."

"Oh!" she said. "Well, it's been paragraphed in all the papers.

Sullivan is giving a reception in the Gold Rooms of the Grand Babylon Hotel. Of course, it will be largely theatrical,--Sullivan has to mix a good deal with that cla.s.s, you know; it's his business,--but there will be a lot of good people there. You'll come, won't you? It's to celebrate the five hundredth performance of 'My Queen.' Rosetta Rosa is coming."

"I shall be charmed. But I should have thought you wouldn't ask Rosa after what you've just said."

"Not ask Rosa! My dear Carl, she simply won't go anywhere. I know for a fact she declined Lady Casterby's invitation to meet a Serene Highness. Sir Cyril got her for me. She'll be the star of the show."

The theatre darkened once more. There were the usual preliminaries, and the orchestra burst into the prelude of the second act.

"Have you ever done any crystal-gazing?" Emmeline whispered.

And some one on the floor of the house hissed for silence.

I shook my head.

"You must try." Her voice indicated that she was becoming excited again. "At my reception there will be a spiritualism room. I'm a believer, you know."

I nodded politely, leaning over the front of the box to watch the conductor.

Then she set herself to endure the music.

Immediately the second act was over, Sullivan returned, bringing with him a short, slight, bald-headed man of about fifty. The two were just finis.h.i.+ng a conversation on some stage matter.

"Smart, let me introduce to you my cousin, Carl Foster. Carl, this is Sir Cyril Smart."

My first feeling was one of surprise that a man so celebrated should be so insignificant to the sight. Yet as he looked at me I could somehow feel that here was an intelligence somewhat out of the common.

At first he said little, and that little was said chiefly to my cousin's wife, but there was a quietude and firmness in his speech which had their own effect.

Sir Cyril had small eyes, and small features generally, including rather a narrow forehead. His nostrils, however, were well curved, and his thin, straight lips and square chin showed the stiffest determination. He looked fatigued, weary, and hara.s.sed; yet it did not appear that he complained of his lot; rather accepted it with sardonic humor. The cares of an opera season and of three other simultaneous managements weighed on him ponderously, but he supported the burden with stoicism.

"What is the matter with Alresca to-night?" Sullivan asked. "Suffering the pangs of jealousy, I suppose."

"Alresca," Sir Cyril replied, "is the greatest tenor living, and to-night he sings like a variety comedian. But it is not jealousy.

There is one thing about Alresca that makes me sometimes think he is not an artist at all--he is incapable of being jealous. I have known hundreds of singers, and he is the one solitary bird among them of that plumage. No, it is not jealousy."

"Then what is it?"

"I wish I knew. He asked me to go and dine with him this afternoon.

You know he dines at four o'clock. Of course, I went. What do you think he wanted me to do? He actually suggested that I should change the bill to-night! That showed me that something really was the matter, because he's the most modest and courteous man I have ever known, and he has a horror of disappointing the public. I asked him if he was hoa.r.s.e. No. I asked him if he felt ill. No. But he was extremely depressed.

"'I'm quite well,' he said, 'and yet--' Then he stopped. 'And yet what?' It seemed as if I couldn't drag it out of him. Then all of a sudden he told me. 'My dear Smart,' he said, 'there is a misfortune coming to me. I feel it.' That's just what he said--'There's a misfortune coming to me. I feel it.' He's superst.i.tious. They all are.

Naturally, I set to work to soothe him. I did what I could. I talked about his liver in the usual way. But it had less than the usual effect. However, I persuaded him not to force me to change the bill."

Mrs. Sullivan struck into the conversation.