Standing where he could see her he thought that on this occasion she threw into her scene, which was the best she had in the play, a brighter art than ever before, a talent that could play with its problem. She was perpetually doing things out of rehearsal (she did two or three to-night, in the other man's piece), that he as often wished to heaven Nona Vincent might have the benefit of. She appeared to be able to do them for every one but him--that is for every one but Nona. He was conscious, in these days, of an odd new feeling, which mixed (this was a part of its oddity) with a very natural and comparatively old one and which in its most definite form was a dull ache of regret that this young lady's unlucky star should have placed her on the stage. He wished in his worst uneasiness that, without going further, she would give it up; and yet it soothed that uneasiness to remind himself that he saw grounds to hope she would go far enough to make a marked success of Nona. There were strange and painful moments when, as the interpretress of Nona, he almost hated her; after which, however, he always assured himself that he exaggerated, inasmuch as what made this aversion seem great, when he was nervous, was simply its contrast with the growing sense that there WERE grounds--totally different--on which she pleased him.
She pleased him as a charming creature--by her sincerities and her perversities, by the varieties and surprises of her character and by certain happy facts of her person. In private her eyes were sad to him and her voice was rare. He detested the idea that she should have a disappointment or an humiliation, and he wanted to rescue her altogether, to save and transplant her. One way to save her was to see to it, to the best of his ability, that the production of his play should be a triumph; and the other way--it was really too queer to express--was almost to wish that it shouldn't be. Then, for the future, there would be safety and peace, and not the peace of death--the peace of a different life. It is to be added that our young man clung to the former of these ways in proportion as the latter perversely tempted him. He was nervous at the best, increasingly and intolerably nervous; but the immediate remedy was to rehearse harder and harder, and above all to work it out with Violet Grey. Some of her comrades reproached him with working it out only with her, as if she were the whole affair; to which he replied that they could afford to be neglected, they were all so tremendously good. She was the only person concerned whom he didn't flatter.
The author and the actress stuck so to the business in hand that she had very little time to speak to him again of Mrs. Alsager, of whom indeed her imagination appeared adequately to have disposed.
Wayworth once remarked to her that Nona Vincent was supposed to be a good deal like his charming friend; but she gave a blank "Supposed by whom?" in consequence of which he never returned to the subject. He confided his nervousness as freely as usual to Mrs. Alsager, who easily understood that he had a peculiar complication of anxieties.
His suspense varied in degree from hour to hour, but any relief there might have been in this was made up for by its being of several different kinds. One afternoon, as the first performance drew near, Mrs. Alsager said to him, in giving him his cup of tea and on his having mentioned that he had not closed his eyes the night before:
"You must indeed be in a dreadful state. Anxiety for another is still worse than anxiety for one's self.""For another?" Wayworth repeated, looking at her over the rim of his cup.
"My poor friend, you're nervous about Nona Vincent, but you're infinitely more nervous about Violet Grey.""She IS Nona Vincent!"
"No, she isn't--not a bit!" said Mrs. Alsager, abruptly.
"Do you really think so?" Wayworth cried, spilling his tea in his alarm.
"What I think doesn't signify--I mean what I think about that. What I meant to say was that great as is your suspense about your play, your suspense about your actress is greater still.""I can only repeat that my actress IS my play."Mrs. Alsager looked thoughtfully into the teapot.
"Your actress is your--"
"My what?" the young man asked, with a little tremor in his voice, as his hostess paused.
"Your very dear friend. You're in love with her--at present." And with a sharp click Mrs. Alsager dropped the lid on the fragrant receptacle.
"Not yet--not yet!" laughed her visitor.
"You will be if she pulls you through."
"You declare that she WON'T pull me through."Mrs. Alsager was silent a moment, after which she softly murmured:
"I'll pray for her."
"You're the most generous of women!" Wayworth cried; then coloured as if the words had not been happy. They would have done indeed little honour to a man of tact.
The next morning he received five hurried lines from Mrs. Alsager.
She had suddenly been called to Torquay, to see a relation who was seriously ill; she should be detained there several days, but she had an earnest hope of being able to return in time for his first night.
In any event he had her unrestricted good wishes. He missed her extremely, for these last days were a great strain and there was little comfort to be derived from Violet Grey. She was even more nervous than himself, and so pale and altered that he was afraid she would be too ill to act. It was settled between them that they made each other worse and that he had now much better leave her alone.
