Part 24 (1/2)
”It will mean a good deal; but it will mean everything I'd rather it didn't mean if the success is owing to her.”
”But it will be your play. In one sense its success will always be dependent upon others. Really, Harry, I don't follow you.
What is your objection to Mrs. Lamb? She's never done you any harm.”
”No, she hasn't done me any harm--as yet.”
”As yet! Do you think she means to? Considering that she proposes to produce your play, and bids fair to make a great success of it, it doesn't look as if she did.”
”Meg--you'll laugh at me--I'm afraid of her.”
”Afraid of her?--of Mrs. Lamb!--Harry!”
”I've never been comfortable in her presence since the first moment I've met her. When she's there I have the sort of feeling which I imagine a nervous person might have in the neighbourhood of a dangerous lunatic. I don't know when or how she will break out, but I feel that sometime, somehow, she will, and that then I shall have to struggle with her for my life.”
”Harry! are you in earnest?”
He laughed oddly.
”Meg, upon my word, I can't tell you. She hypnotises me, that woman--she hypnotises me. Her influence is on me even after I have left her.”
”She must be a curious person. I should like to meet her.”
”Meet her?”
He shuddered, involuntarily. ”Rather than that you should meet her I'd---- If I can prevent it you shall not meet her.”
”Why not? I know plenty of people who have met her, and who seem to think her a distinctly agreeable person--hospitable, good company, amusing, kindhearted, generous to a degree. Tell me, Harry, has she ever behaved to you in any way as she ought not to have done?”
”She has not, in one jot or t.i.ttle.”
”To your knowledge has she ever done, or even said, anything wrong?”
”No. Still, I would rather she did not produce my play, especially if she is to act Lady Glover.”
”Will she produce it if she doesn't?”
”I doubt it.”
”There is something at the back of your mind which you're keeping to yourself. When I think of all that the success of 'The Gordian Knot' would mean to us, of how you've looked forward to its production, of how we've talked and talked of it, your present att.i.tude is incomprehensible. It doesn't follow that because Mrs. Lamb produces your play--and even acts in it!--that you need therefore make of her a bosom friend if you'd rather not. I don't suppose it's only generosity which impels her; I daresay she has an axe of her own to grind.”
”You may be sure of it.”
”Then so have you. I don't see how it matters if it's A, B, or C who grinds it, so long as it's ground--properly ground; and you seem sure that it will be that.”
”I have little doubt of it.”
”Then tell me, Harry, what is the real, downright reason why you don't wish Mrs. Lamb to produce your play, and act in it?”