ly to them I was the manager, the sole
person responsible. My wearily spoken explanations were to them
incomprehensible lies. The quarter of an hour might have been worse for
me had I been sufficiently alive to understand or care what they were
saying. A dull, listless apathy had come over me. I felt the scene only
stupid, ridiculous, tiresome. There was some talk of giving me "a damned
good hiding." I doubt whether I should have known till the next morning
whether the suggestion had been carried out or not. I gathered that the
true history of the play, the reason for the sudden alterations, had
been known to them all along. They appeared to have reserved their
virtuous indignation till this evening. As explanation of my apparent
sleepiness, somebody, whether in kindness to me or not I cannot say,
suggested I was drunk. Fortunately, it carried conviction. No further
trains left the town that night; I was allowed to depart. A deputation
promised to be round at my lodgings early in the morning.

Our leading lady had left the theatre immediately on the fall of the
curtain; it was not necessary for her to wait, her husband acting as her
business man. On reaching my rooms, I found her sitting by the fire.
It reminded me that our agent in advance having fallen ill, her husband
had, at her suggestion, been appointed in his place, and had left us on
the Wednesday to make the necessary preparations in the next town on our
list. I thought that perhaps she had come round for her money, and the
idea amused me.

"Well?" she said, with her one smile. I had been doing my best for some
months to regard it as soul-consuming, but without any real success.

"Well," I answered. It bored me, her being there. I wanted to be alone.

"You don't seem overjoyed to see me. What's the matter with you? What's
happened?"

I laughed. "Vane's bolted and taken the week's money with him."

"The beast!" she said. "I knew he was that sort. What ever made you take
up with him? Will it make much difference to you?"

"It makes a difference all round," I replied. "There's no money to pay
any of you. There's nothing to pay your fares back to London."

She had risen. "Here, let me understand this," she said. "Are you the
rich mug Vane's been representing you to be, or only his accomplice?"

"The mug and the accomplice both," I answered, "without the rich.
It's his tour. He put my name to it because he didn't want his own to
appear--for family reasons.