“Listen!” Boobee said. He used the imperative ascolta. “Listen to me. Grace is insane… Tonight, dinner is late. I was very hungry, and if I do not have my dinner punctually I lose my appetite. Grace knows this well, but when I arrived at the house there is no dinner. There is nothing to eat. She is in the kitchen burning something in a pan. I explain to her with courtesy that I must have a punctual dinner. Then you know what happens?”
I knew, but it seemed tactless to say that I knew. I said, “No.”
“You could not imagine,” he said. He put a hand to his heart. “Listen,” he said. “She cries.”
“Women cry easily, Boobee,” I said.
“Not European women.”
“But you didn’t marry a European.”
“That is not all. The madness now comes. She cries, and when I ask her why she cries, she explains that she is crying because in becoming my wife she has given up a great career as a soprano in opera.”
I don’t suppose there is much difference between the sounds of a summer night?a late-summer night?in my country and Italy, and yet it seemed so then. All the softness had gone out of the night air?fireflies and murmuring winds?and the insects in the grass around me made a sound as harsh and predatory as the sharpening of burglar’s tools. It made the distance he had come from Verona seem immense. “Opera!” he cried, “La Scala! It is because of me that she is not performing tonight in La Scala. She used to take singing lessons, that is so, but she was never invited to perform. Now she is seized with this madness.”
“A great many American women, Boobee, feel that in marriage they have given up a career.”
“Madness,” he said. He wasn’t listening. “Complete madness. But what can one do? Will you speak to her?”
“I don’t know what good it will do, Boobee, but I’ll try.”
“Tomorrow. I’ll be late. Will you speak to her tomorrow?”
“Yes.”
He stood and pulled on his gloves, finger by finger. Then he tossed on his plush hat with its imaginary feathers and asked, “What is the secret of my charm?my incredible ebullience?”
“I don’t know, Boobee,” I said, but a warm feeling of sympathy for Grace spread through my chest.
“It is because my philosophy of life includes a grasp of consequences and limitations. She has no such philosophy.”
He then got into his car and started it up so abruptly that he scattered gravel all over the lawn.
I turned off the lights on the first floor and went up to our bedroom, where my wife was reading. “Boobee was here,” I said. “I didn’t call you.”
“I know. I heard you talking in the garden.” Her voice was tremulous, and then I saw there were tears on her cheek.
“What’s the matter, darling?”
“Oh, I feel that I’ve wasted my life,” she said. “I have the most terrible feeling of waste. I know it isn’t your fault, but I’ve really given too much of myself to you and the children. I want to go back to the theatre.” I should explain about my wife’s theatrical career. Some years ago a company of amateurs in the neighborhood performed Shaw’s Saint Joan. Margaret had the lead. I was in Cleveland on business, through no choice of my own, and I didn’t see the performance, but I am convinced that it was outstanding. There were to be two performances, and when the curtain came down at the end of the first there was a standing ovation. Margaret’s performance has been described to me as brilliant, radiant, magnetic, and unforgettable. There was so much excitement that several directors and producers in New York were urged to come out for the second night. Several of them accepted. I was, as I have said, not there, but Margaret has told me what happened. It was a blindingly bright, cold morning. She drove the children to school and then returned and tried to rehearse her lines, but the telephone kept ringing. Everyone felt that a great actress had been discovered. It clouded over at ten, and a north wind began to blow. It began to snow at half past ten, and by noon the storm developed into a blizzard. The schools closed at one and the children were sent home. More than half the roads were closed by four. The trains were running late or not at all. Margaret was unable to get her car out of the garage, so she walked the two miles to the theatre. None of the producers or directors could make it, of course, and only half the cast showed up, so the performance was canceled. Plans were made to repeat the performance later, but the Dauphin had to go to San Francisco, the theatre was booked for other things, and the producers and directors who had agreed to come seemed, on second thought, to be suspicious about going so far afield. Margaret never played Joan again. She had the most natural regrets. The praise that had been poured into her ears rang there for months. A thrilling promise had been broken and, as anyone would, she felt that her disappointment was legitimate and deep.
