HIS conference, of which the finest flower had been the "Eve song" and "The Policeman's Sonata," had taken place on the Wednesday after what was now called, without reservation, the "bust-up" of the "Eleanor" show; but it might have taken place on any other day of that week or almost any day of the week following.
To Bellsmith it had been a source of amazement to find how simply the company did actually settle into its altered status. Like most persons unaccustomed to trouble, he had fully looked for the end of the world after Saturday night. Rising, the next morning, from a tossing five hours in bed, he had had a strong inclination not even to shave. From personal humiliation one can frequently understand the drift toward sackcloth and ashes. The sound of Annie running the vacuum- cleaner in the upper halls had seemed to Bellsmith distinctly a false note, one unpleasantly out of key with the sense of abasement made fitting by the occasion.
When, however, he had discovered that the lemon-colored sun really had risen in the east and that outside the windows the crowds on Main Street were gabbling along to nine o'clock mass or hurrying sternly home with their Sunday papers, it had begun to dawn on him that the world might still go on after all and that he himself might still take some small part in it. After coffee and marmalade (and, on better judgment, the shave) he had even begun to feel brisk and ambitious.
There had been one relieving feature of the morning—that he himself had not been obliged to attend that eleven o'clock assembly at the Lyceum Theater when the news was broken to the members of the company. That had been agreed upon the previous evening.
"You leave 'em to me," Barnes had insisted. "You leave 'em' to me. I know that bunch like a book, and they 'll do whatever I tell 'em."
Wholly regardless of the nature of the news which he had to impart, the barrack lawyer in Barnes had quite looked forward to appearing before his associates, clothed at last in actual authority. After that conference it would be difficult to believe that Barnes had not deliberately brought about the wreck of the "Eleanor" show in order to reorganize it on his own finer suggestions.
Bellsmith's part had been to see Dr. MacVickar the first thing on Monday morning and ascertain whether or not he could be assured of five thousand dollars from some source which would not require the pledging of any of his property held up by the Pilgrim Trust Co.
It cannot be truthfully said that Dr. MacVickar had felt any great sense of risk in agreeing, if necessary, to pledge all the property he had in the world, reserving, of course, his stethoscope and the little round plate that he sometimes wore on his forehead to peer into people's tonsils.
"Since I got you into this mess," he declared, "I suppose that I have got to get you out of it, or, rather, get you in still deeper, which has been my purpose from the first."
"Just the same," added the doctor, "it all shows the uncertainty of human affairs. Here I was relying on your case to give me a trip to the Continent."
Then, as frequently happened, a certain professional instinct froze him up sharply and he added: "Now, for heaven's sake, please don't ever repeat that remark even as a joke. The world does not understand jokes, and a physician is hedged about with far more restrictions than a clergyman."
Bellsmith also took the occasion of this call to ask details about Tilly Marshall but again a professional code had seized upon Dr. MacVickar.
"Young man," he admonished, "there are certain sides of my practice which must always remain a closed book to you. Just because your own case proved to be so much of an afternoon tea-party you must n't suppose that a nerve specialist does not sometimes have to dabble pretty deep in the human frame. If you must, look up 'neurosis' and 'psychosis' in your encyclopedia when you get home. Miss Marshall is an instance of the one and you are an instance of the other. If things had gone on as they were, two or three weeks longer. Miss Marshall would have been a very sick little girl."
Bellsmith had, however, drawn out the envelope which had been given him on the preceding Saturday evening by Israels and explained its contents. Dr. MacVicker undertook its transmission willingly enough.
"And if," added Bellsmith, rather shame-faced, "there are to be more of these, it can be understood that the company is still in active existence?"
"0h, quite!" replied Dr. MacVickar.
The adjustment of the "Eleanor" company itself had worked out in a manner very similar to that of Tommy Knight's birthday party—by a process of natural selection.