It was late on the morning after the night she sang Elsa, when Thea Kronborg stirred uneasily in her bed. The room was darkened by two sets of window shades, and the day outside was thick and cloudy. She turned and tried to recapture unconsciousness, knowing that she would not be able to do so. She dreaded1 waking stale and disappointed after a great effort. The first thing that came was always the sense of the futility2 of such endeavor, and of the absurdity3 of trying too hard. Up to a certain point, say eighty degrees, artistic4 endeavor could be fat and comfortable, methodical and prudent5. But if you went further than that, if you drew yourself up toward ninety degrees, you parted with your defenses and left yourself exposed to mischance. The legend was that in those upper reaches you might be divine; but you were much likelier to be ridiculous. Your public wanted just about eighty degrees; if you gave it more it blew its nose and put a crimp in you. In the morning, especially, it seemed to her very probable that whatever struggled above the good average was not quite sound. Certainly very little of that superfluous6 ardor7, which cost so dear, ever got across the footlights. These misgivings8 waited to pounce9 upon her when she wakened. They hovered10 about her bed like vultures.
She reached under her pillow for her handkerchief, without opening her eyes. She had a shadowy memory that there was to be something unusual, that this day held more disquieting11 possibilities than days commonly held. There was something she dreaded; what was it? Oh, yes, Dr. Archie was to come at four.
A reality like Dr. Archie, poking12 up out of the past, reminded one of disappointments and losses, of a freedom that was no more: reminded her of blue, golden mornings long ago, when she used to waken with a burst of joy at recovering her precious self and her precious world; when she never lay on her pillows at eleven o’clock like something the waves had washed up. After all, why had he come? It had been so long, and so much had happened. The things she had lost, he would miss readily enough. What she had gained, he would scarcely perceive. He, and all that he recalled, lived for her as memories. In sleep, and in hours of illness or exhaustion13, she went back to them and held them to her heart. But they were better as memories. They had nothing to do with the struggle that made up her actual life. She felt drearily14 that she was not flexible enough to be the person her old friend expected her to be, the person she herself wished to be with him.
Thea reached for the bell and rang twice,—a signal to her maid to order her breakfast. She rose and ran up the window shades and turned on the water in her bathroom, glancing into the mirror apprehensively15 as she passed it. Her bath usually cheered her, even on low mornings like this. Her white bathroom, almost as large as her sleeping-room, she regarded as a refuge. When she turned the key behind her, she left care and vexation on the other side of the door. Neither her maid nor the management nor her letters nor her accompanist could get at her now.
When she pinned her braids about her head, dropped her nightgown and stepped out to begin her Swedish movements, she was a natural creature again, and it was so that she liked herself best. She slid into the tub with anticipation16 and splashed and tumbled about a good deal. Whatever else she hurried, she never hurried her bath. She used her brushes and sponges and soaps like toys, fairly playing in the water. Her own body was always a cheering sight to her. When she was careworn17, when her mind felt old and tired, the freshness of her physical self, her long, firm lines, the smoothness of her skin, reassured18 her. This morning, because of awakened19 memories, she looked at herself more carefully than usual, and was not discouraged. While she was in the tub she began to whistle softly the tenor20 aria21, “Ah! Fuyez, douce image,” somehow appropriate to the bath. After a noisy moment under the cold shower, she stepped out on the rug flushed and glowing, threw her arms above her head, and rose on her toes, keeping the elevation22 as long as she could. When she dropped back on her heels and began to rub herself with the towels, she took up the aria again, and felt quite in the humor for seeing Dr. Archie. After she had returned to her bed, the maid brought her letters and the morning papers with her breakfast.
“Telephone Mr. Landry and ask him if he can come at half-past three, Theresa, and order tea to be brought up at five.”
When Howard Archie was admitted to Thea’s apartment that afternoon, he was shown into the music-room back of the little reception room. Thea was sitting in a davenport behind the piano, talking to a young man whom she later introduced as her friend Mr. Landry. As she rose, and came to meet him, Archie felt a deep relief, a sudden thankfulness. She no longer looked clipped and plucked, or dazed and fleeing.
Dr. Archie neglected to take account of the young man to whom he was presented. He kept Thea’s hands and held her where he met her, taking in the light, lively sweep of her hair, her clear green eyes and her throat that came up strong and dazzlingly white from her green velvet23 gown. The chin was as lovely as ever, the cheeks as smooth. All the lines of last night had disappeared. Only at the outer corners of her eyes, between the eye and the temple, were the faintest indications of a future attack—mere kitten scratches that playfully hinted where one day the cat would claw her. He studied her without any embarrassment24. Last night everything had been awkward; but now, as he held her hands, a kind of harmony came between them, a reëstablishment of confidence.
“After all, Thea,—in spite of all, I still know you,” he murmured.
She took his arm and led him up to the young man who was standing25 beside the piano. “Mr. Landry knows all about you, Dr. Archie. He has known about you for many years.” While the two men shook hands she stood between them, drawing them together by her presence and her glances. “When I first went to Germany, Landry was studying there. He used to be good enough to work with me when I could not afford to have an accompanist for more than two hours a day. We got into the way of working together. He is a singer, too, and has his own career to look after, but he still manages to give me some time. I want you to be friends.” She smiled from one to the other.
The rooms, Archie noticed, full of last night’s flowers, were furnished in light colors, the hotel bleakness26 of them a little softened27 by a magnificent Steinway piano, white bookshelves full of books and scores, some drawings of ballet dancers, and the very deep sofa behind the piano.
“Of course,” Archie asked apologetically, “you have seen the papers?”
“Very cordial, aren’t they? They evidently did not expect as much as I did. Elsa is not really in my voice. I can sing the music, but I have to go after it.”
“That is exactly,” the doctor came out boldly, “what Fred Ottenburg said this morning.”
They had remained standing, the three of them, by the piano, where the gray afternoon light was strongest. Thea turned to the doctor with interest. “Is Fred in town? They were from him, then—some flowers that came last night without a card.” She indicated the white lilacs on the window sill. “Yes, he would know, certainly,” she said thoughtfully. “Why don’t we sit down? There will be some tea for you in a minute, Landry. He’s very dependent upon it,” disapprovingly28 to Archie. “Now tell me, Doctor, did you really have a good time last night, or were you uncomfortable? Did you feel as if I were trying to hold my hat on by my eyebrows29?”
He smiled. “I had all kinds of a time. But I had no feeling of that sort. I couldn’t be quite sure that it was you at all. That was why I came up here last night. I felt as if I’d lost you.”
She leaned toward him and brushed his sleeve re............