mp, the bad-tempered look of his boots, by the nervous
impatience of his stride, that Mr. Rathbone was coming to see her in a
state of agitation. One would hardly have believed that, without having
seen his face at all, she would be so prepared for his behaviour when he
arrived as to greet him anxiously from the door, even before he came in,
with "Good heavens, what _is_ the matter?"

"How do you know anything is the matter?"

"I guessed. I saw your steps."

"Everything is going wrong about the play. The expenses get larger every
day. To sell even _one_ ticket for a charity, they tell me, is simply
out of the question! I must invite everybody, and even then most of them
won't come. Just think, my dear Miss Luscombe, all this trouble, worry,
and expense for amateurs to play _Romeo and Juliet_ at an invitation
performance to an absolutely empty house!"

"Why do you think it will be empty?... Your friends?"

"My friends? You're my only friend! Every chap at the Club I have spoken
to about it said they would be out of town that day. One or two said
they would come on afterwards and join me at supper. Supper! I said it
was a _matinee_; so then they suggested I should give a dinner
afterwards. And even women, they're quite as bad. I mentioned it to Lady
Walmer. She is always so keen on going everywhere, and makes a hobby of
odd charities and things. She said she was going yachting that day, and
also that she was going to a wedding."

"What does it matter just about Lady Walmer?"

"Nothing, but it's an indication. Do we want to have no one in a theatre
but the dressmakers who made the costumes? Miss Luscombe--Flora! I am
beginning to think we'd better chuck it."

"Oh, Mr. Rathbone! The waste and the disappointment!"

"It would be a greater waste to make an utter fool of oneself in an
empty house than to postpone it. I'm nervous. I'm really frightened. I'm
beginning to see that I've been a fool. As to disappointment, _that_,
Flora, you could console me for if you chose."

"Oh, Mr. Rathbone!"

"You really have been so sweet, so patient, it's my opinion that you are
an angel!"

"Oh, indeed I'm not!"

"Well, you have the patience of one. You never think about yourself.
You're all kindness and sweetness and thought for other people. To speak
perfectly frankly, you have only one tiny fault, Flora. And that is,
that you seem a _little_ artificial. But it's my opinion that such
affectations as you have are natural to y