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Joan Thursday

<h2>XIV</h2> Though it was after three in the morning when Joan got home, she wasn't, as she had thought to be, the only waking person in the house. She had no sooner entered than, fagged though she was, she grasped this knowledge with a thrilling heart. Beneath the door of the back-parlour a thin yellow line of light shone, as brilliant in the obscurity as the rim of a newly minted coin. She paused; and there came to her ears the swift staccato chattering of a typewriter. Of a sudden she remembered how long it was since John Matthias had been anything but an abstraction in the background of her consciousness. He might have been at home for days: she had neither known nor thought of him, so wrapped up had she been with the routine of her work and the formless intrigue of emotions stimulated by the personality of Charlie Quard. But now Charlie had eliminated himself from her life (she was quite sure that she would never see him again) while to the man labouring late, behind that closed door, she must be even more a dim reminiscence than ever before. It stung her pride to think that Matthias had been able to forget her so easily. And she regretted bitterly that she herself had been so ready to let the image of her absent-minded benefactor fade upon the tablets of her memory. By way of mute apology and recompense she hastened to enshrine anew in her heart her ideal of a gentleman; and it was fashioned in the likeness of John Matthias. And she resolved not to let another day pass without approaching him. She was sure he would help her if he could; and she was very anxious to make him realize her again. But morning found her in quite another humour, one as diffident as different. And promptly she made a discovery so infinitely dismaying that it put the man altogether out of her mind for the time being. The Deans, she learned, had on the previous day received an offer for an engagement at a summer park in the Middle West, and had accepted, packed up and departed, all in an afternoon. So she was more lonely than ever she had been since leaving home. The bedroom of the Dancing Deans, that salon where those stars of remote and lowly constellations had assembled to afford Joan her only glimpses of social life, was empty, swept and garnished. Those whom she had met there, and who had been nice to her, those scatter-brained, kind-hearted, shiftless denizens of the vaudeville half-world, were once again removed from her reach. She spent that day and the next on the streets, trudging purposefully through the withering heat of August, once more a figure of the pageant which marches that most dolorous way, theatrical Broadway in the dog-days; one with the groups of idling actors with their bluish jowls and shabby jauntiness, one with and yet aloof from that drift of inexplicable creatures of stunted bodies and shoddy finery, less women than children, wistful of mien, with their strange, foreign faces and predatory eyes, bold and appealing to men, defiant to women.... Nothing came of it: the agencies took no more interest in her fortunes than they had before she could truthfully lay claim to stage experience. Each night she crawled home, faint with fatigue and the burden of the broiling day, to relish the bitter flavour of the truth that she would never go far without influence. The third day she spent at home, resting and furbishing up her wardrobe to make a good appearance in the evening. Toward nightfall she bathed, did up her hair in a new and attractive way, shrewdly refrained from dressing her face with rouge and powder after the fashion the Deans had taught her, and clothed herself simply and sweetly in her best skirt and a fresh shirtwaist—both recent purchases. In the deepening gloom of evening she mounted guard alone upon the stoop. Circumstances could not have proved more favourable; and since her eyes were quick to distinguish the tall and slender figure of Matthias the moment he turned out of Longacre Square, the length of the block away, she had ample time to prepare herself. And yet it was with growing consternation that she watched his approach, and when at last he ran lightly up the steps, she was so hampered by embarrassment that the words she had framed to address him went unuttered, and her tentative movement to rise was barely perceptible—a start, a sinking back. So that Matthias, in his preoccupation, received only a faint impression that he had somehow disturbed the girl (whoever she might be) and lifting his hat, murmured an inarticulate word of apology and brushed past her into the vestibule. As the door of the back-parlour was noisily closed, tears of anger and mortification started to Joan's eyes. Then promptly temper overcame that which had daunted her calmer mood. Before she knew it she was knocking at Matthias's door. He answered immediately and in person, with his coat off and his collar unfastened by way of preparation for a long night's work. Staring blankly, he said "Oh?" in a mechanical and not at all encouraging manner. "Mr. Matthias—" Joan began with a slight, determined nod. "Oh—good evening," he stammered. Seeing him more at loss than herself, her self-confidence returned in some measure. "You don't remember me, Mr. Matthias," she asserted with a cool smile. He shook his head slowly: "So sorry—I've got a shocking memory. It'll come back to me in a minute. Won't you—ah—come in?" Joan said "Thanks," in a low voice, and entered. "I am Joan Thursday," she added with a hint of challenge in voice and glance. "Oh, yes, Miss Thursday—of course! Won't you sit down?" Matthias offered her an easy chair, but the girl was quite aware, as she accepted it, that he was still vainly racking his memory for some clue to the identity of Joan Thursday. "You were very kind to me one night about six weeks ago," she said, choosing her words carefully in order not to offend his fastidious taste. "Don't you remember? It was a rainy night, and I had nowhere to go, and you let me stay here—" "Oh!" he exclaimed, his face lighting up. "Of course, I remember now. Joan Thursday—to be sure! You left me a little note of thanks. I've often wondered what became of you." "I've been living here, right in this house, ever since." "You don't mean it. How very odd! I should think we'd have met before this, if that's the case." "You've had plenty of chances," she laughed, feeling a little more at ease. She rested her head against the back of the chair and regarded him through half-lowered lashes, conscious that the lamplight was doing full justice to her prettiness. "I've seen you dozens of times." "That's funny!" he observed, genuinely perplexed. "I don't see how that could have happened—!" "You were always too busy thinking about something else to look at poor me," she returned; and then, intuitively sensitive to the affectation of the adjective "poor" (a trick picked up from one of Maizie's women friends) she amended it hastily: "at me, I mean." "Well, I don't understand it, but I apologize for my rudeness, just the same," he laughed; and sat down, understanding that the girl wanted something and meant to stay until she got it, wondering what it could be, and a little annoyed to have his working time thus gratuitously interrupted. "So," he ventured, "you fixed things up to stop here, did you? At least, I seem to remember you—ah—weren't in very good form, financially, that night we met." "Yes," she said, "I fixed it up all right. I'd lost my money, but the next day I found it again, and I came back here because I didn't know where else to go, and besides there was my friends upstairs—the Deans, you know." "Oh, yes, to be sure. And did they help you find work on the stage? You did want to go on the stage, if I'm not mistaken." "Yes; that's why I left home, you know. But they didn't help me any—the Deans didn't—at least, not exactly; though it was through them I met a fellow who took me on for a vaudeville turn." "Why, that's splendid!" said Matthias, affecting an enthusiasm which he hardly felt. "And—you made good—eh?" "Well"—she laughed a little consciously—"I guess I did make good. But he didn't. He was a boozer, and they threw us out of the bill last Wednesday." "That's too bad," said Matthias sympathetically. "I see." And truly he did begin to see: she was out of a job and wanted assistance to another. It wasn't the first time—nor yet merely the hundredth—that he had been approached on a similar errand. People seemed to think that—simply because he wrote plays which, if produced at all, scored nothing more than indifferent successes at best!—he could wheedle managers into providing berths for every sorry incompetent who caught the footlight fever. It was very annoying. Not that he wouldn't be glad to place them all, given time and influence; but he had neither. Joan, watching him closely, saw his face darken, guessed cunningly the cause. And suddenly the buoyant assurance which had been hers up to this stage in their interview deserted her utterly. No longer enheartened by faith in the potency of her good looks and the appeal of her necessity, she became again the constrained and timid girl of unreasonable and inarticulate demands. After a brief silence, Matthias looked up with a smile. "I don't suppose you have anything else in sight?" Joan shook her head. "And you need a job pretty hard—eh?" "Oh, I do!" she cried. "I haven't hardly any money, and the Deans have gone away, and the agencies won't pay any attention to me—" "I understand," he interrupted. "Half a minute: I'll try to think of something." Unconsciously he began to pace the way his feet had worn from door to window. "How old are you?" he asked abruptly. She started and instinctively lied: "Twenty...." His surprise was unconcealed: "Really?" She faltered unconvincing amendment: "Nearly." "No matter," he said briskly. "It comes to the same thing: you're under twenty. The stage is no place for girls of your age. Don't you think you'd better chuck it—go home?" Not trusting herself to speak, she shook her head, her eyes misty with disappointment. "Besides, you're too good looking...." Struck by her unresponsiveness, he paused to glance at her, and noted with consternation the glimmer of tears in her lashes. "Oh, I say! Don't cry—we'll find something for you, never fear!" "I'm sorry," she gulped. "I—I didn't mean to.... Only, I can't go home, and I must find something to do, and you'd been so kind to me, once, I thought—" "And I will!" he asserted heartily. "I'm only trying to advise you.... I don't want to preach about the immorality of the theatre. A sensible girl is as safe on the legitimate stage as she would be in a business office—safer! But theatrical work has other effects on one's moral fibre, just as disastrous, in a way. It's lazy work; barring rehearsals, you won't find yourself driven very hard—unless ambition drives you, and you've got uncommon ability and mean to get to the top. Otherwise, you won't have much to do, even if constantly engaged. You'll get average small parts; you may be on in one act out of three or four. But even if you appear in every act, you'll only be in the theatre three hours or so a day. The rest of it you'll waste, nine chances out of ten. You'll lie abed late, and once up it won't seem worth while starting anything before it's time to show up at the theatre. That's the real evil of stage life: to every hard-working actor it turns out a hundred—five hundred—too lazy even to act their best, of no real use either to themselves or to the world." He checked and laughed in a deprecatory manner. "I didn't mean to speechify like this, but I do know what I'm talking about." Joan had listened, admiring Matthias intensely, but thoroughly sceptical of his counsel, to the tenor of which she paid just sufficient heed to perceive that doubts admitted would condemn her cause. "I mean to succeed," she said in an earnest voice: "I mean to work hard, and I do believe I'll make good, if I ever get a chance." "Then that's settled!" assented Matthias promptly. "The thing to do now is to find out what you can do with a chance." He pawed the litter of papers on the table, and presently brought to light a typed manuscript in blue paper covers. "This," he said, rustling the leaves, "is the first act of a play we're going to put on early in September. It goes into rehearsal in a week or ten days. There's a small part in the first act—a stenographer in a law office—a slangy, self-sufficient girl—you might be able to play. As I say, it's small; but it's quite important. It's the fashion nowadays, you know, to write pieces with small casts and no parts that aren't vital to the action. If you should bungle, it would ruin the first act and might kill the play. But I'm willing to try you out at rehearsals—with the distinct understanding that if you don't fit precisely you'll be released and somebody else engaged who we're sure can play it." "That's all I ask," said the girl. "You—you're awful' kind—" "Nonsense: I'd rather have you than anyone else I can think of just now, because you're pretty, and pretty women help a play a lot; and the man who's putting this piece on would rather have you because he'll get you for less money than he'd have to pay an actress of experience. So, if you make good, all hands will be pleased." "Shall I begin to study now?" Joan asked, offering to take the manuscript. "Not necessary. Your part will be given you when the first rehearsal is called. I merely want to refresh my memory, to see how much you'll have to do." He ran hastily through the pages. "As I thought: you are on at the opening for about ten minutes, and near the end of the act for a two-minute scene. Twelve minutes' work a day for, say, twenty-five dollars a week: that isn't bad. You'll be out of the theatre by half-past nine every night.... You see the point I've been trying to make?" "Yes," Joan assented. "It seems very easy. I hope I can do it." "I'm sure you can," said Matthias. "But—how are you going to live between now and the opening?" Joan's eyes were blank. "Have you any money?" he insisted. "A very little," she faltered—"eighteen dollars—" "You won't get pay for rehearsals; and they'll last three weeks; after we open it will be another week before the ghost walks. That's—say—six weeks you've got to scrape through somehow. Eighteen dollars won't cover that. Perhaps you'd better go back to your old job until we start." "I was fired from the last, and it would take more than two weeks for me to find anything like it, I know." "And there you are!" Matthias tossed the manuscript back to the table, waved his hands eloquently and threw himself into a chair, regarding her with his whimsical, semi-apologetic smile. "I'm afraid," he added after a minute, "I've reached the end of my string. Further suggestions will have to come from you." "I don't know," said the girl doubtfully. "Maybe I can think of something—maybe something will turn up." "I hope so. Perhaps even I may invent something. If I do, I'll let you know, Miss Thursday." He arose, his manner an invitation to go, to which she couldn't be blind. She got up, moved slowly toward the door. "I hope I haven't bothered you much—put you out of your writing—" "Oh, that's all right," he interrupted insincerely. "And you have been awful' good to me." "Please don't think of it that way." He was holding the door for her, but on the threshold she hesitated. "Unless," she ventured half-heartedly—"unless I could help you some way with your work." "Help me?" he exclaimed, at once amazed and amused. "I mean, copying—if you ever have any." "Type-writing?" She nodded, with a flush of hope. "When I was a kid—I mean, before I left school—I studied a while at a business college—nights, you know. They taught me type-writing by the touch system, but I couldn't seem to get the hang of shorthand, and so had to give it up and go to work in a store." "Now that is a helpful thought!" he cried, turning back into the room. "Wait a minute. There may be something in this. Let me think." But his deliberation was very brief. "It can be done!" he announced in another moment. "I have got a lot of stuff to be copied. You see, about a month ago I...." He checked, his eyes clouding without cause apparent to the girl. "Well!" he went on with a nervous laugh—"I didn't feel much like work. Guess I must've done too much of it, for a while. Anyway, I found I had to quit, and went out of town for a while. Of course I couldn't stop work really—a man can't, if he likes his job—and so I took some manuscripts along and revised them in long-hand. Now they ought to be copied—I'd been thinking of sending them out to some public stenographer—but if you want the work, it's yours." <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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