The Red House Mystery and Other Novels. A. A. Milne
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his own idea having been (very regretfully) to leave out the two parables and three reminiscences from India, and concentrate on the love-scene with the widow.
"Yes, yes," he said. "Your plan is better. I will say you are ill. It is true; you are mad. To-morrow we will play it as it was written."
"You can't," said the author gloomily. "The critics won't come till the Fourth Act and they'll assume that the Third Act ended as it did tonight. The Fourth Act will seem all nonsense to them."
"True. And I was so good, so much myself in that Act." He turned to Prosper. "You--fool!"
"Or there's another way," began the author. "We might----"
And then a gentleman in the gallery settled it from the front of the curtain. There was nothing in the programme to show that the play was in four Acts. "The Time is the present-day and the Scene is in Sir Geoffrey Throssell's town-house," was all it said. And the gentleman in the gallery, thinking it was all over, and being pleased with the play and particularly with the realism of the last moment of it, shouted, "Author." And suddenly everybody else cried, "Author! Author." The Play was ended.
* * * * *
I said that this was the story of a comedy which nearly became a tragedy. But it turned out to be no tragedy at all. In the three Acts to which Prosper Vane had condemned it the play appealed to both critics and public, for the Fourth Act (as he recognised so clearly) was unnecessary, and would have spoilt the balance of it entirely. Best of all, the shortening of the play demanded that some entertainment should be provided in front of it, and this enabled Mr. Levinski to introduce to the public Professor Wollabollacolla and Princess Collabollawolla, the famous exponents of the Bongo-Bongo, that fascinating Central African war dance, which was soon to be the rage of society. But though, as a result, the takings of the Box Office surpassed all Mr. Levinski's previous records, our friend Prosper Vane received no practical acknowledgment of his services. He had to be content with the hand and heart of the lady who played _Winifred_, and the fact that Mr. Levinski was good enough to attend the wedding. There was, in fact, a photograph in all the papers of Mr. Levinski doing it.
XVI. THE DOCTOR
"May I look at my watch?" I asked my partner, breaking a silence which had lasted from the beginning of the waltz.
"Oh, _have_ you got a watch?" she drawled. "How exciting!"
"I wasn't going to show it to you," I said. "But I always think it looks so bad for a man to remove his arm from a lady's waist in order to look at his watch--I mean without some sort of apology or explanation. As though he were wondering if he could possibly stick another five minutes of it."
"Let me know when the apology is beginning," said Miss White. Perhaps, after all, her name wasn't White, but, anyhow, she was dressed in White, and it's her own fault if wrong impressions arise.
"It begins at once. I've got to catch a train home. There's one at 12.45, I believe. If I started now I could just miss it."
"You don't live in these Northern Heights, then?"
"No. Do you?"
"Yes."
I looked at my watch again.
"I should love to discuss with you the relative advantages of London and Greater London," I said; "the flats and cats of one and the big gardens of the other. But just at the moment the only thing I can think of is whether I shall like the walk home. Are there any dangerous passes to cross?"
"It's a nice wet night for a walk," said Miss White reflectively.
"If only I had brought my bicycle."
"A watch _and_ a bicycle! You _are_ lucky!"
"Look here, it may be a joke to you, but I don't fancy myself coming down the mountains at night."
"The last train goes at one o'clock, if that's any good to you."
"All the good in the world," I said joyfully. "Then I needn't walk." I looked at my watch. "That gives us five minutes more. I could almost tell you all about myself in that time."
"It generally takes longer than that," said Miss White. "At least it seems to." She sighed and added, "My partners have been very autobiographical to-night."
I looked at her severely.
"I'm afraid you're a Suffragette," I said.
As soon as the next dance began I hurried off to find my hostess. I had just caught sight of her when----
"Our dance, isn't it?" said a voice.
I turned and recognised a girl in blue.
"Ah," I said, coldly cheerful, "I was just looking for you. Come along."
We broke into a gay and happy step, suggestive of twin hearts utterly free from care.
"Why do you look so thoughtful?" asked the girl in blue after ten minutes of it.
"I've just heard some good news," I said.
"Oh, do tell me!"
"I don't know if it would really interest you."
"I'm sure it would."
"Well, several miles from here there may be a tram, if one can find it, which goes nobody quite knows where up till one-thirty in the morning probably. It is now," I added, looking at my watch (I was getting quite good at this), "just on one o'clock and raining hard. All is well."
The dance over, I searched in vain for my hostess. Every minute I took out my watch and seemed to feel that another tram was just starting off to some unknown destination. At last I could bear it no longer and, deciding to write a letter of explanation on the morrow, I dashed off.
My instructions from Miss White with regard to the habitat of trams (thrown in by her at the last moment in case the train failed me) were vague. Five minutes' walk convinced me that I had completely lost any good that they might ever have been to me. Instinct and common sense were the only guides left. I must settle down to some heavy detective work.
The steady rain had washed out any footprints that might have been of assistance, and I was unable to follow up the slot of a tram conductor of which I had discovered traces in Two-hundred-and-fifty-first Street. In Three-thousand-eight-hundred-and-ninety-seventh Street I lay with my ear to the ground and listened intently, for I seemed to hear the ting-ting of the electric car, but nothing came of it; and in Four-millionth Street I made a new resolution. I decided to give up looking for trams and to search instead for London--the London that I knew.
I felt pretty certain that I was still in one of the Home Counties, and I did not seem to remember having crossed the Thames, so that if only I could find a star which pointed to the south I was in a fair way to get home. I set out to look for a star; with the natural result that, having abandoned all hope of finding a man, I immediately ran into him.
"Now then," he said good-naturedly.
"Could you tell me the way to"--I tried to think of some place near my London--"to Westminster Abbey?"
He looked at me in astonishment. His feeling seemed to be that I was too late for the Coronation and too early for the morning service.
"Or--or anywhere," I said hurriedly. "Trams, for instance."
He pointed nervously to the right and disappeared.