“This theater is halfway to the never-never land,” I commented as I began to unpack.
“I should live so—I never saw the like of it,” Jake said earnestly. “How are people going to find their way here? Yesterday I began to talk about signs by the side of the road. Right off at once, Varduk said no. I begged like a poor relation left out of his uncle’s will. Finally he said yes—but the signs must be small and dignified, and put up only a day before the show begins.”
I wanted to ask a question about his adventure of the previous night, but Jake shook his head in refusal to discuss it. “Not here,” he said. “Gib, who knows who may be listening?” He dropped his voice. “Or even what might be listening?”
I lapsed into silence and got out old canvas sneakers, flannel slacks and a Norfolk jacket, and changed into them. Dressed in this easy manner, I left the boathouse and stood beside the lake. At once a voice hailed me. Sigrid was walking along the water’s edge, smiling in apparent delight.
We came face to face; I bent to kiss her hand. As once before, it fluttered under my lips, but when I straightened again I saw nothing of distaste or unsteadiness in her expression.
“Gib, how nice that you’re here!” she cried. “Do you like the place?”
“I haven’t seen very much of it yet,” I told her. “I want to see the inside of the theater.”
She took her hand away from me and thrust it into the pocket of the old white sweater she wore. “I think that I love it here,” she said, with an air of gay confession. “Not all of the hermit stories about me are lies. I could grow truly fat—God save the mark!—on quiet and serenity.”
“Varduk pleases you, too?” I suggested.
“He has more understanding than any other theatrical executive in my experience,” she responded emphatically. “He fills me with the wish to work. I’m like a starry-eyed beginner again. What would you say if I told you that I was sweeping my own room and making my own bed?”
“I would say that you were the most charming housemaid in the world.”
Her laughter was full of delight. “You sound as if you mean it, Gib. It is nice to know you as a friend again.”
It seemed to me that she emphasized the word “friend” a trifle, as though to warn me that our relationship would nevermore become closer than that. Changing the subject, I asked her if she had swum in the lake; she had, and found it cold. How about seeing the theater? Together we walked toward the lodge and entered at a side door.
The auditorium was as Jake had described it to me, and I saw that Varduk liked a dark tone. He had stained the paneling, the benches, and the beams a dark brown. Brown, too, was the heavy curtain that hid the stage.
“We’ll be there tonight,” said Sigrid, nodding stageward. “Varduk has called the first rehearsal for immediately after dinner. We eat together, of course, in a big room upstairs.”
“May I sit next to you when we eat?” I asked, and she laughed yet again. She was being as cheerful as I had ever known her to be.
“You sound like the student-hero in a light opera, Gib. I don’t know about the seating-arrangement. Last night I was at the head of the table, and Varduk at the foot. Jake and Mr. Davidson were at either side of me.”
“I shall certainly arrive before one or the other of them,” I vowed solemnly.
Varduk had drifted in as we talked, and he chuckled at my announcement.
“A gallant note, Mr. Connatt, and one that I hope you can capture as pleasantly for the romantic passages of our Ruthven. By the by, our first rehearsal will take place this evening.”
“So Miss Holgar has told me,” I nodded. “I have studied the play rather prayerfully since Davidson gave me a copy. I hope I’m not a disappointment in it.”
“I am sure that you will not be,” he said kindly. “I did not choose disappointing people for my cast.”
Davidson entered from the front, to say that Martha Vining had arrived. Varduk moved away, stiff in his walk as I had observed before. Sigrid and I went through the side door and back into the open.
That evening I kept my promise to find a place by Sigrid at the table. Davidson, entering just behind me, looked a trifle chagrined but sat at my other side, with Martha Vining opposite. The dinner was good, with roast mutton, salad and apple tart. I thought of Judge Pursuivant’s healthy appetite as I ate.
After the coffee, Varduk nodded to the old man who served as caretaker, cook and waiter, as in dismissal. Then the producer’s hazel eyes turned to Sigrid, who took her cue and rose. We did likewise.
“Shall we go down to the stage?” Varduk said to us. “It’s time for our first effort with Ruthven.”
VII
Rehearsal
We went down a back stairway that brought us to the empty stage. A light was already burning, and I remember well that my first impression was of the stage’s narrowness and considerable depth. Its back was of plaster over the outer timbers, but at either side partitions of paneling had been erected to enclose the cell-like dressing-rooms. One of the doors bore a star of white paint, evidently for Sigrid. Against the back wall leaned several open frames of wood, with rolls of canvas lying ready to be tacked on and painted into scenery.
Varduk had led the way down the stairs, and at the foot he paused to call upward to Davidson, who remained at the rear of the
