Part 64 (1/2)
Freddie looked up dully from his reading. The abrupt stoppage of his professional career--his life-work, one might almost say--had left Freddie at a very loose end; and so hollow did the world seem to him at the moment, so uniformly futile all its so-called allurements, that, to pa.s.s the time, he had just been trying to read the _National Geographic Magazine_.
”Hullo!” he said. ”Well, might as well be here as anywhere, what?” he replied to the other's question.
”But why aren't you playing?”
”They sacked me! They've changed my part to a bally Scotchman! Well, I mean to say, I couldn't play a bally Scotchman!”
Mr. Pilkington groaned in spirit. Of all the characters in his musical fantasy on which he prided himself, that of Lord Finchley was his pet.
And he had been burked, murdered, blotted out, in order to make room for a bally Scotchman.
”The character's called 'The McWhustle of McWhustle' now!” said Freddie sombrely.
The McWhustle of McWhustle! Mr. Pilkington almost abandoned his trip to Rochester on receiving this devastating piece of information.
”He comes on in Act One in kilts!”
”In kilts! At Mrs. Stuyvesant van d.y.k.e's garden-party! On Long Island!”
”It isn't Mrs. Stuyvesant van d.y.k.e any longer, either,” said Freddie.
”She's been changed to the wife of a pickle manufacturer.”
”A pickle manufacturer!”
”Yes. They said it ought to be a comedy part.”
If agony had not caused Mr. Pilkington to clutch for support at the back of a chair, he would undoubtedly have wrung his hands.
”But it _was_ a comedy part!” he wailed. ”It was full of the subtlest, most delicate satire on Society. They were delighted with it at Newport! Oh, this is too much! I shall make a strong protest! I shall insist on these parts being kept as I wrote them! I shall.... I must be going at once, or I shall miss my train.” He paused at the door.
”How was business in Baltimore?”
”Rotten!” said Freddie, and returned to his _National Geographic Magazine_.
Otis Pilkington tottered into his cab. He was shattered by what he had heard. They had ma.s.sacred his beautiful play and, doing so had not even made a success of it by their own sordid commercial lights.
Business at Baltimore had been rotten! That meant more expense, further columns of figures with ”frames” and ”rehl.” in front of them!
He staggered into the station.
”Hey!” cried the taxi-driver.
Otis Pilkington turned.
”Sixty-five cents, mister, if _you_ please! Forgetting I'm not your private shovoor, wasn't you?”
Mr. Pilkington gave him a dollar. Money--money! Life was just one long round of paying out and paying out.
II
The day which Mr. Pilkington had selected for his visit to the provinces was a Tuesday. ”The Rose of America” had opened at Rochester on the previous night, after a week at Atlantic City in its original form and a week at Baltimore in what might be called its second incarnation. Business had been bad in Atlantic City and no better in Baltimore, and a meagre first-night house at Rochester had given the piece a cold reception, which had put the finis.h.i.+ng touches to the depression of the company in spite of the fact that the Rochester critics, like those of Baltimore, had written kindly of the play. One of the maxims of the theatre is that ”out-of-town notices don't count,” and the company had refused to be cheered by them.